LettersHong Kong to ban vaping? Good news for the tobacco industry
- Several of my smoking friends have given up cigarettes in favour of vaping. Most of them are likely to revert to cigarettes rather than give up completely
My outrage was prompted, in large part, by a story I remembered seeing on the BBC website a couple of months ago, on how Public Health England, a UK government advisory body, has carried out research and concluded that vaping is far less harmful to health and is the most effective tool yet for people trying to quit smoking.
Is the Hong Kong government so deep in the pockets of the local tobacco industry that they have collectively decided to do away with all forms of competition? It seems unlikely, but I really can’t think of another reason for their decision.
In the interest of full disclosure, I am a smoker who has never vaped in his (no doubt shortened) life, but several of my smoking friends have already given up cigarettes in favour of vaping. My guess is that most of them will revert to cigarettes rather than giving up completely, so the government has actually made the public health situation far worse. It seems like madness to me.
Alan Loynd, Lai Chi Kok
Not just e-cigarettes, city needs to quit all forms of smoking