More Smokers Turning to E-Cigs to Quit Per CDC

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has reported that e-cigarettes are now the top method smokers use to quit smoking. But the organization threw in a negative aspect of their report by proclaiming that most smokers who use e-cigarettes fail to completely give up tobacco cigarettes.

CDC released its report after a 26-month study on smoking cessation. The study involved nearly 16,000 adult smokers and was published in Preventing Chronic Disease, a peer-reviewed journal. That means that the study can be taken seriously, but anti-vapers are on a spin campaign to play up the negatives.

The study’s purpose was to determine the effectiveness of various methods of quitting smoking. While the discovery was made that e-cigarettes are the most popular method smokers choose, it was also found that pharmaceutical products do a better job of helping people to completely give up smoking. Overall, the study concluded that the majority of smokers, nearly 75%, ended up using more than one method in trying to kick the habit.

Vaping advocates say that with the publication of the study, CDC has finally acknowledged the popularity of e-cigarettes as a quit smoking method. Opponents of e-cigarettes often ignore the use of the vaping to help smokers improve their health and instead tout e-cigarettes as a new habit that non-smokers, especially kids, are picking up. Gregory Conley of the American Vaping Association says that this isn’t the first time CDC has discovered that smokers choose e-cigarettes as a smoking cessation method, but opponents of vaping perpetuate a myth that there is “no evidence” that vaping helps smokers.

The American Lung Association, not a fan of e-cigarettes, responded to the study by drawing attention to the fact that it showed e-cigarettes to be less effective than FDA-approved products like gums and patches. ALA president Harold Wimmer went a step further in his comments by making a completely false statement as he accused e-cigarette manufacturers of “making unproven quit smoking claims about their products.” In reality, e-cigarette manufacturers and retailers are not allowed by law to declare that e-cigarettes are a smoking cessation aid, and if someone were to review many vaping web sites and vaping products labels, proving Wimmer’s accusation would be a very difficult task.

Conley says that the ALA is “feigning outrage” over the CDC study and accused the organization of being blinded by ideology or financial concerns that don’t allow it to see the positive health benefits of e-cigarette use by smokers.

Even the surgeon general, Dr. Vivek Murthy, admits that e-cigarettes might be helpful to adult smokers. At the end of 2016 Murthy declared that vaping is a threat to the youth of America, but acknowledges that his report didn’t consider the possible health benefits of e-cigarettes to people who already smoke.