A professor has argued that tighter restrictions will soon be introduced in Europe for e-cigarettes, despite there being little in the way of conclusive evidence of physical danger to health posed by the devices.

 

University of Leicester professor Jason Hughes recently spoke to the Leicester Mercury, claiming that recent legislation, such as the Tobacco Products Directive that was recently passed by the European Parliament, is based on social rather than health concerns over e-cigs.

 

He believes that the recent EU Directive was underpinned by an argument that electronic cigarettes will “re-normalise” smoking and was lacking any strong evidence.

 

“Restricting the amount of nicotine in e-cigarettes to 20mg per ml is problematic for several reasons. The key one is smokers who switch to vaping (a term for e-cigarette use) might characteristically start at strengths higher than 20mg/ml to get an equivalent ‘hit’ to a conventional cigarette.

 

“The new limit means it will be less likely that combustible tobacco users will transfer to a safer source of nicotine.

 

“There have been a lot of public scares about the possible health risks of using e-cigarettes but, as yet, there are no long-term clinical studies that can confirm or refute such claims.

 

“It would appear that to some extent e-cigarettes are currently ‘guilty by association’ with their combustible counterparts, and those associations have in part driven heightened public and policy concerns.”

 

Liberty Flights, an e-cig retailer, often responds to news and policy related to e-cigarettes. A spokesman for the company believes that there are too many contradicting arguments surrounding e-cigs.

 

“One of the funny things about the argument that e-cigs will normalise smoking is that the regulation that they’re planning to bring in almost exclusively vilify refillable electronic cigarettes that have no resemblance to traditional cigarettes, while disposable e-cigs which do have a striking resemblance to tobacco cigs largely won’t be. Where is the logic in that? There isn’t any.

 

“Professor Hughes, like many noted professors and scientists before him, is absolutely right in pointing out flaws in the arguments against, and hysteria surrounding, e-cigs.

 

“Nearly 2 million Britons now smoke and tobacco sales were also down last year. We think it would be a crying shame if electronic cigarettes were regulated to the extent that it dissuaded people from using them.”

 

Liberty Flights is one of the leading electronic cigarette sellers in the United Kingdom. The company was launched in 2009 and by selling a wide selection of quality e-cigs, accessories and liquids they’ve gone on to become one of the biggest companies in the industry. They have several physical shops and an online shop where they sell their affordable products. Visit www.liberty-flights.co.uk for more information on electronic cigarettes.