'Pro-vaping' advocates silent on vaping bans
Thursday, April 21, 2016 at 9:49 I'm currently scheduled to be on Five Live between ten and eleven this morning.
It may not happen because I've been warned there could be a breaking news story that could push the item down the running order but if it goes ahead I'll be talking to Peter Allen about Nottinghamshire County Council's ban on smoking and vaping at work.
As you can see from previous posts, Forest seems to be fighting a lone battle on this issue, even on the use of e-cigarettes. Where are all the 'pro-vaping' advocates?
Oh, here's one.
The Smoke Free Policy also has the backing of the county council leader Alan Rhodes, along with health professionals across Notts.
Professor John Britton, director of the UK Centre for Tobacco and Alcohol related studies, based at the University of Nottingham, welcomed the plans.
"This is terrific news," he said.
OK, I've edited this for maximum effect. For the full quote click here – Smoking breaks stubbed out for Nottinghamshire County Council workers).
As you'll see Britton is talking exclusively about smoking. But why no reference to vaping? After all, the council's policy includes a ban on the use of e-cigarettes, a product Britton has previously endorsed as an important harm reduction tool.
In 2013, for example, he featured in this BBC report (Electronic cigarettes – miracle or menace?):
"Nicotine itself is not a particularly hazardous drug," says Professor John Britton, who leads the tobacco advisory group for the Royal College of Physicians.
"It's something on a par with the effects you get from caffeine.
"If all the smokers in Britain stopped smoking cigarettes and started smoking e-cigarettes we would save five million deaths in people who are alive today. It's a massive potential public health prize."
My guess is that Britton – like most 'pro-vaping' public health advocates – is so delighted to see smoking prohibited that he doesn't want to stir the pot by protesting against the ban on vaping.
Or perhaps he just doesn't care.
Vapers, as I wrote yesterday, are collateral damage in the war on tobacco.
'Pro-vaping' public health advocates are not what they seem. Vaping is a means to an end. The long-term goal is not a smoke free society but a world free of nicotine 'addiction'.
Policies like the one introduced by Notts County Council brings that day closer than they could have hoped for.
The silence from 'pro-vaping' public health advocates on the prohibition of e-cigarettes is so loud it can be heard from Nottingham to Little Haven and beyond.
Bizarrely it is rarely if ever commented upon by vaping activists who cling to the hope (belief?) that their 'friends' in public health will save the day. Forget it.
Here's another example.
It's just been announced that Chesterfield Royal Hospital is to ban smoking and vaping throughout its grounds – Chesterfield Royal Hospital to become completely smoke-free site (Derbyshire Times).
The threat of a ban was first mentioned last year. A decision was expected in the autumn but has only now been made.
Forest made as much noise as we could. Here's an article I wrote for the Derbyshire Times – Why there shouldn’t be a complete smoking ban at Chesterfield Royal Hospital – as we were frequently quoted by the local press.
We were up against it however because the hospital's Twitter account made it quite clear, even while a 'consultation' was taking place, where their sympathies lay (Chesterfield Royal Hospital tweets).
I'm not sure when a ban on vaping entered the equation but I've not heard a single 'pro-vaping' advocate oppose the hospital's new policy.
Their silence speaks volumes.
Reader Comments (5)
One reason there isn't much protest from vapers themselves could be that vaping bans are pretty ineffective and don't much inconvenience the vaper. Vaping is already banned in most pubs and cafes, workplaces, trains, station platforms, planes, hotel rooms. It's a little like the hunting ban. Plenty of hunting still goes on. The only serious inconvenience to vapers would be if HMRC had the capacity to open every parcel arriving in the UK from China, after the TPD restrictions on eliquid come in to force next month.
The vaping issue has certainly highlighted a corrupt agenda (the SHS myth) but, other than that, I'm as interested in the woes of vapers as much as most are of mine - zilch.
Whatever they think and whatever they say, to smokerphobic thugs Vaping is smoking and vapers are smokers.
But as Jonathan says, they can get away with it so why should they care about bans? Of course we know why they should care because one ban is only to be able to implement the next ban and by the time they make smoking and vaping illegal - ie - ban both everywhere and ban sales of both - it will be far too late.
Personally, if I see a vaper at it inside or in a banned place then I'll light up and if challenged I'll respond and say that I am only doing what I just saw another banned person do, so the stealth vaping will be exposed and then these thugs will lay on expensive courses to teach security employees how to spot the stealth vaper. "Oooh", I hear Debs et al say, "more funding for us - yippee."
Sorry chaps. Really, I am. But this, as you have proved, is war and we all have to fight in the only ways open to us. "Do as you are done unto" is my motto and if no one stands up for us , I sure as hell won't stand for anyone else.
As for Notts council. I note they say smoking is the scourge of modern society. This isn't true. Now, as in history, the scourge of our societies is fascism and this council has shown it's true thuggish ideology.
Vaping, smoking and obesity are things that most of us, Skinny and fat people, vapers and smokers who have half a brain, recognise are far more healthy than the fascism being enforced upon us all using smokers and smoking as the wedge to prise open the means to pushing more bans, more diktats, and more control over other aspects of people's private lives that frankly they have no right to interfere with.
I was born a smoker, I'll die a smoker. They can do what they like but I will ignore all and any ban that now comes in. All smokers and vapers and have a duty to do so.
The only way to beat them is to keep on ignoring what they say. However, it would be really nice if Forest made a public show this time and maybe organised a bus trip to a council car park in Nottingham so we can smoke and vape, eat donuts, drink Coca cola, and show them we will all ignore this latest piece of bullying from people who really should be prosecuted for open discrimination and abuse against one targeted group of employees.
That is my policy too now Pat. I ignore all bans and restrictions. I feel much better for it ! Notts employees should get together, smokers and vapers and tell them to shove this monstrous interference in peoples lives.
Chesterfield just following Sherwood Forest Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust. Bans at Newark Hospital, King’s Mill Hospital and Mansfield Community Hospital. Inside and Outside including vaping.
http://newarkadvertiser.co.uk/articles/news/1CNOMRAsAbqpIMQGasj1EH6EJZcBRCmSjhOtNxB7CPI41
Non-smokers freedoms are going up in smoke too, though they may not realise.
I read the EU health strategy, a few years, ago which included action on Tobacco, Alcohol and Fast Food. The arguments they are using are basically the same. Laws will follow and non-smokers will have their rights curtailed. Their objections already defeated.