I am a nurse-clinician specializing in the treatment of smoking. I have accompanied adult smokers and ex-smokers in their fight against cigarettes for nearly 20 years. I am outraged to know that thousands of smoking patients I have helped will soon be left on their own.
I am still trying today to understand why the government persists in wanting to ban flavors from vaping products. Where is the scientific logic and common sense of a government that claims to be pragmatic?
With my clinical experience with adult smokers, I have seen how addiction to smoked nicotine keeps these women and men trapped in their smoking. A vicious circle in which the combustion produced by cigarette smoke, responsible for multiple chronic diseases, is the sworn enemy of public health that must be tackled. But let’s be clear, it is not enough to lecture a smoker to succeed in convincing him to quit his cigarette.
Vaping was invented to help smokers quit smoking in order to break out of this harmful circle of addiction.
I was able to see it during my tobacco consultations: the vaper offered a revolutionary new tool for smokers… A lifeline for smokers struggling with their toxic addiction to smoked tobacco.
Adult smokers need this “crutch” to ease their smoking transition. For example, smokers need comfort and confidence with the products they are going to use. The gesture of vaping is noticeably reminiscent of that of smoking. Smokers who vape enjoy vaping and get the dose of nicotine they really need. It should be noted, according to studies that have looked at the choice of perfumes used by smokers, that the vast majority of them do not want to vape a tobacco-flavored perfume, which reminds them of cigarettes.
A proven tool
If the government bans flavors in vaping products, one can imagine that a large majority of ex-smokers will revert to their old behaviors and simply go back to buy a pack of cigarettes at the convenience store. As a nurse-clinician, also specialized in harm reduction since the introduction of vapers, I find this decision irresponsible and purely dogmatic. The draft regulations that the government is about to table go against the new orientations of Health Canada, which recognizes vaping as being less harmful than smoking. Vaping is one of the eight smoking cessation strategies advocated by Health Canada, remember!
What concerns me is that I have the sad impression that the Minister of Health is about to throw the baby out with the bathwater, as if perfumes were responsible for the rise in vaping among young people. As a society, we must be concerned about vaping among young people and do everything we can to counter this scourge that affects thousands of families. That being said, adult ex-smokers should not be deprived of a recognized and proven smoking cessation tool, to end the highly toxic form of nicotine use that is the smoked cigarette. .
Before banning flavors in electronic cigarettes, Minister Dubé and his fellow ministers must instead think about access to vaping products. In Ontario, a province that Prime Minister Legault nevertheless seeks to imitate, the authorities authorize the sale of vaping products with flavors, but only in specialized shops which restrict access to young people. The Ontario model, which has not been widely marketed by anti-tobacco groups and the industry, is by far the most acceptable compromise to both allow adult ex-smokers to vape flavored products and to restrict access among young people. Why is Minister Dubé turning a blind eye to this passageway?