Sure, you only have one ‘on a night out’ or if ‘everyone else is’ but the reality is most vapers are using a bar more often than that.
And now the UK smoking and vaping law changes to tackle them are set to be scrapped, it looks like the growing habit won’t be going anywhere.
But a doctor has warning for vapers of the dangers that might not be seen for ’20 or 30 years’.
While the government has been attempting to crack down on vaping, Action on Smoking and Health found that by last year, 20.5 percent of children had tried vaping. The Office for National Statistics also previously found around 4.5 million vapers in the population of Great Britain – likely to have increased.
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And despite many people using vapes to get themselves off of cigarettes, this NHS doctor has worries on people using them instead.
Dr Ahmed Ezzat often shares his advice on TikTok, and said: “Who would have thought that back in the 1920s to 1940s, doctors on every billboard were trying to promote smoking cigarettes, even claiming, with the tobacco companies, that smoking cigarettes cured or treated asthma and shortness of breath.
“If anyone was to the say that now it would be absolutely farcical. So in the same way, we’re kind of seeing history repeat itself.”
The London-based general surgery says there’s plenty of parallels between vapes and cigarettes.
“If you look at smoking, it took 40 years [to see the health implications]. Let’s wait another few decades and see what happens with vaping.
“Just because there isn’t enough evidence yet to prove that it’s harmful, it doesn’t mean in any way that there is no harm,” he says. “They could be very harmful, and that the effects won’t be known until 20 or 30 years from now.”
Ezzat has been using TikTok to campaign and educate users on vaping as he commented on how kids under 18 are picking up vapes and yet ‘have never smoked cigarettes before’.
“People buying these very cheap £2 vapes that are colourful that I see at every bus stop. These are kids coming out of schools,” he added.
“These flavours normalise it, instead of somebody buying, say chewing gum or chocolate, they buy a vape that is perceptually seen as being cool.”
And he says the behaviour of adults vaping around kids isn’t helping as there is a ‘cultural confusion’.
“There’s a matrix where people haven’t quite registered that vaping is smoking and vaping is just as bad,” he explained
“But – and this is where it becomes tricky – vaping has a use, but it certainly is not for children or those who’ve never smoked before. The NHS recommends vaping for those in a controlled way for those who are trying to stop cigarette smoking and can’t stop. [For] individuals who are addicted to smoking, vaping absolutely has a use under a regulated way, in consultation with a doctor.”