“Because evidence indicates that e-cigarette use can increase the odds of quitting smoking, many scientists, including this essay’s authors, encourage the health community, media, and policymakers to more carefully weigh vaping’s potential to reduce adult smoking-attributable mortality,” reads the article.
The authors reviewed the health risks of e-cigarettes, their potential for smoking cessation and addressed the concerns about youth vaping. Taking all this into consideration they then highlighted the need to balance any valid concerns regarding teen vaping and the products’ potential benefits for adult smoking cessation.
The arrival of HTPs in Japan has disrupted the cigarette industry
Meanwhile data from Japan illustrates the effect e-cigarettes are having on local smoking rates. Vice director of the AOI Universal Hospital in Kawasaki, Kumamaru Hiroya, said that nicotine replacement therapies (NRTs), such as nicotine patches, have not yielded the desired results. However, since Heated Tobacco Products (HTPs) were launched locally, smoking rates started dropping substantially.
“In conclusion, after nicotine replacement therapy direction has been tried, they were not really a big success. However, ever since 2014, three heated tobacco products have been launched officially nationwide in Japan and these have been penetrating 25 percent [of total smoking population] and this product has been successful to reduce cigarette smoking in Japan so far by 30 percent in three to four years,” said Hiroya during a recent webinar.
US: The 2020 National Youth Tobacco Survey Indicates a Drop in Teen Vaping