A paper entitled “Associations between nicotine vaping uptake and cigarette smoking cessation vary by smokers’ plans to quit: Longitudinal findings from the International Control Four Country Smoking and Vaping Surveys” has appeared in the “Addiction” journal.
The paper was dated 15th September 2022 and included responses from the US, Canada, England and Australia.
The target of the study was to see if vaping influenced smokers to quit smoking or even consider quitting.
Participants were adult daily smokers who had not vaped in the last 6 months and had taken part in two or more waves of the ITC Four Country Smoking and Vaping Surveys. In total there were 2815 people eligible and the studies took part in 3 waves from 2016 to 2020.
Data from the ITC surveys were used to perform this study.
Vaping uptake appears strongly associated with smoking cessation among smokers with no initial plans to quit smoking@RoswellParkhttps://t.co/4JzwilFr1e
— Addiction Journal (@AddictionJrnl) October 11, 2022
Previous Study
Data from the Population Assessment of Tobacco and Health (PATH) study conducted in the US found that daily adult smokers who were not planning to stop smoking experienced 6 TIMES higher odds of planning to quit smoking in the future when they started daily vaping. Just WOW!
Plus daily vaping increased the odds of quitting smoking by 8 times in those who were not planning to ever quit.
“These findings are consistent with experimental studies that have reported that giving NVPs (Nicotine Vaping Products) to unmotivated smokers is positively associated with change in quit intentions and reductions in cigarette smoking”
So in order to examine the role daily vaping plays in the decision to quit smoking this new study was commissioned.
Method
Participants were asked whether they would consider quitting smoking at the start and at follow ups and there were 4 possible responses…
- Quit within 6 months
- Quit in beyond 6 months
- Not planning to quit at all
- Unknown plans to quit
Also they were asked if they ever vaped and how often:
- Daily
- Less than daily but at least once a week
- Less than weekly but at least once a month
- Less than once a month but occasionally
- Not at all.
Current smoking status was ascertained at follow ups to see if smoking had ceased or been reduced.
Having multiple follow ups allowed the change in perception and opinion to be tracked at different stages.
Findings
Overall 12.7% of those surveyed quit smoking.
Those who were not planning to quit within 6 months experienced higher odds of quitting when they began daily vaping – 32.4% vaping daily versus 6.8% who didn’t vape.
The “hardened” smokers who did not plan to quit at baseline faced 11 times greater odds of planning to quit at follow ups when taking up daily vaping! This is the group who need to be targeted to just give vaping a try!
Among the smokers who did plan to quit within the 6 months period the cessation rates between daily vapers and non vapers were similar.
Daily vaping uptake was associated with planning to quit smoking when asked in follow up surveys.
“For daily cigarette smokers who are not planning to quit smoking, uptake of daily vaping is associated with higher smoking cessation rates compared with no uptake of vaping. Smokers not planning to quit tend to be older, heavier smokers of lower SES. Studies focused exclusively on smokers who are already planning or attempting to quit may underestimate a potential benefit of daily vaping for smoking cessation at the population level, including potential to reduce disparities in smoking rates.”
I particularly love this sentence at the end of the publication conclusions…
“daily vaping was associated with smoking cessation, suggesting that vaping company marketing practices, vaping policies/restrictions and public health education campaigns could be undertaken to support smokers’ use of vaping products on a daily basis.”
Totally agree, let people know that even trying vaping could help you consider quitting smoking!
I am sure there are a lot of vapers who quit smoking accidentally when realising they actually preferred vaping – I know of a few personally!
Responses
#vapers were often derided for claiming to be accidental #quitters but it turns out to be a very common thing among #smokers who try vaping with no plans of quitting. https://t.co/ag0Ia48xUE
— Martin Dockrell (@SwitchFinder) October 11, 2022
“Uptake of nicotine vaping appears to be strongly associated with cigarette smoking when taking up daily vaping (32.4%) vs no vaping (6.8%).”
INNCO members have thousands of testimonies which confirm this — our voices are ignored! #SNews https://t.co/3RtQBBvBG5 pic.twitter.com/qdyFWjPPEQ— INNCOorg (@INNCOorg) October 11, 2022
No one who ever bought a nicotine patch or nicotine gum ever “quit smoking by accident.”
32.4% of smokers who have quit completely with e-cigarettes had no intention to quit.https://t.co/edGD4QJSzM
— Charles A. Gardner, PhD (@ChaunceyGardner) October 11, 2022
