VBI statement on new review of the health effects of tobacco cigarettes, e-cigarette and waterpipe use on the body and clinical outcomes

Vape Business Ireland (VBI), Ireland’s largest vaping trade association, are issuing this statement in response to the publication on 26^th June 2020 of a review by the University of Mainz, Germany, which misleadingly states that vaping stiffens the arteries leading to a variety of health issues.

This is the second piece of research on vaping from the University of Mainz in the last six months which has been described by experts in the public health community as being “questionable”, “inappropriate” and which “runs the risk of misleading people”.

A VBI spokesperson said: “A number of world-renowned public health professionals have cast doubt on this paper, which rather than being a rigorous piece of new in-depth research, is in fact a re-hash of incomplete evidence. Even more worryingly, it does not clarify how much of the health effects seen in vapers are due to prior use of tobacco smoking, which given that the overwhelming majority of vapers are ex-smokers, should encourage everyone to who reads this paper to approach it with extreme caution.

“Junk science like this is incredibly harmful to smokers and will only serve to scare them away from switching to vaping, which is much less risky than smoking tobacco and is helping record numbers of Irish people quit. We need to support smokers who are looking for viable alternatives by providing them with genuine, fact-based information, rather than fake news, so that they can make better choices to improve their health.”

A recently published, peer-reviewed study by highly respected scientist Dr Konstantinos Farsalinos (available here), which has not been disputed, found that improvements in vascular function were observed as early as one month after making the switch to vaping.

Rather worryingly some of the Irish coverage of the Mainz paper has not included any of the very strong pushbacks and ‘junk science’ rebuttals from world-renowned scientists and experts in the field of smoking, nicotine and vaping. The full quotes can be found below or on the Science Media Centre website here.