Steam Punked

“We may well have missed, or are missing, the greatest opportunity in a century. The unintended consequence is more lives are going to be lost.” That’s a senior scientist of an anti-smoking group joining a chorus of policy-makers and health advocates who are arguing that the “relentless portrayal of e-cigarettes as a public health menace, however well intentioned, is a profound disservice to the 40 million American smokers who could benefit from the devices.” Is vaping just another tool to enable young people to turn an oral fixation into a lifelong health problem? Or is it the closest we’ve come to developing a way to extend the lives of people who smoke cigarettes, while making it less likely teens will start smoking them in the first place? The feds say it’s too soon to tell, while e-cig proponents say we’re wasting precious time. From the NYT: E-Cigarettes Can’t Shake Their Reputation as a Menace. (When I was young, a lot of kids started smoking because they thought it made them look cool. At least vaping removes that incentive.)

+ Missouri has a tobacco tax on its ballot. And get this: Cigarette companies are urging voters to adopt the tax, while health advocates are against it.