Can e-cigarettes help you quit smoking? Can smokers switch to e-cigarettes to reduce harm? It has always been the focus of attention and controversy in the e-cigarette industry from all walks of life.
In fact, the World Health Organization (WHO) has long given answers to these debates in the report on e-cigarettes released in 2020: there is conclusive evidence that switching from cigarettes to e-cigarettes can reduce harm.
Strong evidence: e-cigarettes can reduce smoking cessation and harm reduction
The WHO cited an assessment of e-cigarettes by the National Academy of Engineering and Medicine (hereinafter referred to as NASEM) in the report.
On the eve of World No Tobacco Day in 2020, WHO released a report on e-cigarettes on 5.25.
Among them, there is solid evidence: "Complete use of electronic cigarettes instead of cigarettes can reduce users' exposure to a variety of toxicants and carcinogens produced by cigarette combustion."
There is substantial evidence that: “E-cigarette use can lead to nicotine dependence, but it is less dependent than cigarettes; e-cigarette smoke may increase the risk of some diseases in the long-term, but the risk is lower than that of cigarettes; switching from cigarettes to e-cigarettes can improve the health of many Organ health."
The WHO specifically pointed out that the latest research shows that the simultaneous use of cigarettes and e-cigarettes can lead to higher levels of oxidative stress and increase the risk of cardiorespiratory health, so dual use is not recommended.
Under reasonable control, electronic cigarettes will help long-term tobacco control
The report concluded that WHO, NASEM, and CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) have all realized the potential of e-cigarettes to improve the public health environment. At the same time, the WHO report also made some recommendations for countries planning to regulate e-cigarettes:
These include requiring e-cigarette companies to standardize sales channels (including online sales) and strictly enforce laws on minimum purchase age; adopt standardized regulations to minimize the health risks of e-cigarette users; prohibit the addition of carcinogens, mutagens and other harmful substances, etc. .
Therefore, if the government controls e-cigarettes reasonably, it can minimize the negative effects of the tobacco epidemic and continue to bring positive effects to public health.
In this regard, the United Kingdom has become a typical success story. The UK has been pursuing a smoke-free plan: phasing out combustible cigarettes by 2030, allowing smokers to quit smoking entirely or switch to lower-risk nicotine delivery systems such as e-cigarettes.
The premise of the UK making this decision is based on long-term scientific research. Back in 2015, Public Health England released a 113-page independent report. The report concluded: Although e-cigarettes are not 100% safe, they are 95% less harmful than tobacco, and the content of harmful chemicals is almost negligible. Policies should encourage smokers to use e-cigarettes as a key tobacco control strategy to reduce the harm caused by smoking.
In order to ensure that e-cigarettes play a positive social role, the UK has formulated sound regulatory policies, including the control of e-cigarette advertisements, long-term follow-up and investigation of social and public health responses, and observation of youth use.
At a time when global tobacco control has become a major trend, how to reduce the harm of cigarettes and thus reduce the national medical financial expenditure caused by related diseases has become a thorny problem for all countries. Absolutely harmless cannot be achieved in the short term, but is it possible to control the intake of harmful substances as a more realistic and more operationally valuable way?
Taking China as an example, although the smoking rate of the Chinese population is currently showing a downward trend, it still remains at a relatively high level, which is in line with the tobacco control goal proposed in the "Healthy China 2030" Plan Outline, that is, the smoking rate of people over the age of 15 should be reduced to 20 in 2030. %, there is still a large gap.
Data source: The Beijing News "2020 Electronic Cigarette Industry Value Report"
Ma Liang, a researcher at the National Institute of Development and Strategy of Renmin University of China, once commented that the absolute harmlessness brought by smoke-free is the best choice, but in the case that harmlessness cannot be achieved in the short term, it is better to advocate a short-term It is difficult to achieve the ideal of smoke-free. It is better to start from the reduction of smoke and harm in reality, and promote smokers to reduce the health hazards caused by smoking and second-hand smoke exposure through smoking replacement and smoking reduction.
Ma Liang believes that whether the merits and demerits of e-cigarettes needs to be compared between the positive and negative evidence, so as to provide a fair opportunity for all parties to the dispute to compete, rather than one-sidedly only accepting some evidence that supports the harmfulness of e-cigarettes. On the one hand, there is a lot of evidence that e-cigarette liquids, aerosols, additives, smoke, etc. will bring various health hazards, and may induce young people to use cigarettes. On the other hand, there is also substantial evidence that e-cigarettes have merit in guiding smokers to quit smoking and reducing health hazards. Science means assessing all evidence comprehensively, rather than jumping to conclusions and accepting only evidence that is consistent with it.
In short, the regulation of e-cigarettes also needs to make decisions based on scientific evidence, traverse the fog of evidence, and promote the cause of smoke-free through evidence-based decision-making. It is true that e-cigarettes are not perfect, but compared with cigarettes, e-cigarette products that have undergone many iterations can significantly reduce the health hazards to users and those exposed to second-hand smoke. In the future, it may have the opportunity to become a powerful tool for tobacco control and harm reduction in more countries.
