Smoking or vaping, nicotine 'addicts' will never be left in peace

Smoking should be banned outside pubs and bars say 'experts'.

The aim is to force smokers to switch to less harmful e-cigarettes.

BBC News reports that:

The Royal Society for Public Health said smoking should be seen as "abnormal" and more controls are needed to cover areas where people gather.

The RSPH is also calling for greater use of e-cigarettes by smoking cessation services, all places selling cigarettes to be forced to also offer e-cigarettes, and e-cigarettes to be renamed vapourisers or nicotine control products as the term is 'misleading'.

It's pretty clear what they're trying to do – make it even harder for people to smoke, forcing them to quit or switch to medicinal e-cigarettes (or nicotine sticks as they'd like to call them).

If that were to happen, and the number of smokers and vapers were to be reversed (ten million vapers, two million smokers), rest assured public health lobbyists would launch a series of campaigns against nicotine addiction and vaping in public places. It's only a matter of time.

I'm not saying smokers shouldn't be encouraged to use e-cigarettes or other harm reduction products but forcing them to make a choice between combustible and electronic cigarettes isn't the way to do it. It's simply another illiberal attack on people's freedom to choose.

It's clear too that even though some admit that nicotine is no more harmful than caffeine, in the eyes of most public health campaigners e-cigarettes are a smoking cessation tool – nothing else.

The idea that people might use e-cigs as a recreational rather than a medicinal device is anathema to them.

Anyway, here's Forest's response to the PCHE report:

"We support proposals that make it easier for smokers to use e-cigarettes but we reject measures that will make it harder for adults to smoke tobacco.

"While it makes sense to encourage smokers to switch from combustible cigarettes to electronic cigarettes, public health campaigns should be based on education not coercion and prohibition.

"Banning smoking outside pubs and bars would discriminate against adults who enjoy smoking.

"Renaming e-cigarettes is a silly idea. It ignores the fact that e-cigs are popular because they mimic the act of smoking. The name is part of their appeal.

"Calling them nicotine sticks or vapourisers suggests a medicinal product and that misses the point.

"For many consumers e-cigarettes are a recreational product. If public health lobbyists don't understand that they could sabotage a potentially game-changing device."

See Encourage use of e-cigarettes but don't discriminate against smokers, says Forest.

We're quoted by the BBC (Call for pub garden smoking ban), Mail Online (Call for smoking ban OUTSIDE pubs) and Guardian (Promote e-cigarettes over harmful tobacco smoking, say experts).

PS. ITV's Good Morning Britain also featured the story this morning. In the studio, discussing the issue, was Rob Lyons of Action on Consumer Choice.

I had to get up early to see that – he was on at 6.20 – but not as early as Rob!

Update: Fancy that! No sooner had I posted this than I read this in a letter in the Scotsman:

"The government should step in and ban e-cigarettes immediately."

There's no pleasing some zealots.

Update: Rob was also on ITV's This Morning and BBC Five Live. I did a handful of local radio stations and later, between four and five, I'll be doing a whole lot more (nine) from the BBC's Cambridge studio.