PLATTSBURGH, NY — Today The Consumer Advocates for Smoke-free Alternatives Association (CASAA) is grateful to a unified group of renowned tobacco control experts who are speaking out in favor of promoting vaping as a low-risk alternative to smoking and correcting misinformation about the use of nicotine. In an unprecedented report published today in the American Journal of Public Health, 15 esteemed scientists, doctors, and public health professionals — all of whom are former presidents of the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco (SRNT) — are drawing attention to the need for balance in the debate and resulting policies around vaping and other safer nicotine products to include the needs of more than just children.

Alex Clark, CASAA’s CEO, echoed the call for balance:

“The experiences of people who smoke and people who are switching to safer nicotine products such as vaping, as well as people who currently smoke, are underweighted in research and policy discussions about tobacco regulations. As a consequence, policies designed almost solely to prevent young people from using tobacco are not serving a majority of people who use nicotine. Low-risk alternatives to smoking have been available for more than a century, but moralizing and zealotry about using nicotine and other drugs are keeping people in the dark where they are suffering avoidable early deaths.”

Mr. Clark went on to say,

“The authors are still promoting coercive policies such as taxation and lowering nicotine content in cigarettes. But by including everyone, not just children, in considering new laws, we’ll have a better chance of identifying and addressing unintended consequences like dangerous supply chains and unscrupulous informal sellers.”

For decades the public has been misled about the relative risks among tobacco and nicotine products in the service of achieving the unrealistic and unattainable goal of a drug-free society. This paper presents a giant step forward toward realizing the real public health mission of reducing the dramatic toll of smoking-attributable early-death and disease.