Vape Tax – Vape Critics – Vape Shops – Vape Documentary and a Vape God
New York Scraps Vape Tax
Not only has the state of New York scrapped the 10cents per ml e-liquid tax they’ve also given vapers another boost.
Despite strong lobbying from cancer charities – plans to add vaping to the ‘indoor smoking’ ban has also been rejected.
Instead of welcoming the move the American Cancer Society is furious with spokesman Bill Sherman saying:
We rely on the goodwill of lawmakers to do the right thing. Unfortunately, the good guys lost here.
Here’s a thought Bill – maybe it’s far better to promote vaping than lumping it in with smoking – I mean as a cancer organization surely it’s in your best interests to get as many people off cigarettes as you can?
Unless of course your and indeed most cancer ‘charities’ have an ulterior motive – thoughts in comments 😉
Local vape stores had fought hard to get the tax and indoor ban removed from the budget and received support from an unlikely source – tobacco giant the Altria Group.
Maybe not such an unlikely source given Big Tobacco are continuing their attempt to take over the vaping industry.
Deeming is making for some strange bedfellows – as is TPD here in Europe – but hey call me a cynic 😉
However the New York Vapor Association is delighted with the decision with vice president Andrew Osborne saying:
We’re very pleased and we’re happy to see New York take a step back from these aggressive regulations that would have essentially decimated the entire industry in the Empire State.
Vaping Critics Funded by Competition
As if we didn’t know or at least suspect – it seems some of the biggest anti e-cigarette health ‘experts’ are funded by Big Pharma.
At least in America and it includes the ‘expert’ – Dr. Richard Hurt – who likened propylene glycol [PG] to antifreeze using the immortal [make that immoral] claim:
One of the solutions that the nicotine and the e-cigarette is dissolved into is called propylene glycol which is a cousin of antifreeze and why anybody would want to puff on something and put that in their mouth is amazing.
Ouch – talk about a misleading opinion lol.
Hurt works for the powerful Minnesota-based Mayo Clinic – specifically the clinic’s Nicotine Dependence Center.
The clinic received around $65,000 from two huge pharmaceutical corporations one of which is household name Pfizer.
According to Watchdog.org:
Pfizer makes Nicotrol NS, a nicotine nasal spray, and Chantix. The company’s website and a ProPublica database show Ebbert racked up $646,584 between 2010 and 2014 in research grants.
GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), which is responsible for Zyban and Nicorette gum and lozenges, paid Ebbert $7,129 in consulting fees in 2010 and 2011.
No-one is saying the clinic or indeed the researchers have been swayed in their opinions [much] of e-cigarettes.
However the conflict of interest is obvious as Boston University public health professor and tobacco control expert Dr. Michael Siegel says:
Conflict of interest refers to a subconscious bias that the researcher isn’t aware of. A conflict of interest creates the appearance of bias, whether it’s present or not.
It’s a phenomenon in the entire e-cigarette industry. Nowhere do [researchers] actually come out and say, ‘e-cigarettes are a lot safer than cigarettes and that there’s a huge relative risk difference between the two.
They’re really using scare tactics to demonize e-cigarettes.
More Vape Shops Opening in UK
It’s all change on UK high streets with banks and clothing stores closing but vape shops opening.
As more and more high street banks shut up shop and move online the empty premises are being snapped up by e-cig businesses – coffee shops and takeaways according to new study.
5,430 shops closed last year however 4,534 new businesses moved in – still a net loss but good news if you like take-aways – caffeine and e-cigs.
The findings from the Local Data Company suggests this year will see even more big names leaving the high street meaning even more chances for vape shops to open up in their place.
A quick wander around my home town shows this is indeed the case and with Totally Wicked opening up a small store here last week – that makes 3 vape shops for a medium sized town.
Looks like a good time to open up a takeaway coffee vape shop 😉
A Billion Lives Now Available Online
The documentary everyone needs to see is now available to watch on any of your devices.
Produced and directed by Aaron Biebert the film blows the lid off the battle between vaping and its opponents and the shady links between them and big tobacco.
To find the truth, award-winning director and executive producer Aaron Biebert traveled across four continents, interviewing medical doctors, scientists, technologists and policy makers from major international health organizations who are working to save the billion lives projected to be lost this century from smoking-related diseases.
What he found was shocking: complete government failure, widespread corruption in the public health community, and the manipulation of both perpetrated by the big businesses who profit from the sale of tobacco and smoking cessation drugs.
A Billion Lives shows how pharmaceutical companies, anti-smoking advocacy groups, tobacco companies, and even our own state and federal governments are to blame for the disinformation, over-regulation, and banning of vapor technology worldwide.
At the time of Writing A Billion Lives is number 5 in the iTunes charts.
You can grab it in any format from:
And finally…Meet the ‘Vape God’
Nope I’m not talking about our Jonny 😉
Say hello to New Jersey based Austin Lawrence who apparently counts Drake [I had to Google him] among his fans.
The former smoker has one hell of a bag of vape tricks in his arsenal and his latest Instagram video has hit 1.5million views and is still rising.
His tricks include the jellyfish – lassos – double helix ropes and even triangles.
He practices 3 to 4 hours each day to perfect his skills and is always looking for new ones.
The former computer student quit smoking when he found vaping and now runs his own vape shop – New Brunswick’s Vertigo Vaporium.
On seeing his vaping trick videos Drake flew him out to his mansion ‘to teach him how to vape’ lol.
‘I’m really just messing around, trying new stuff. Trying to do like crazy stuff. And at night, I’m trying to do really clean stuff that I know will do well for video.
I have to say his tricks are pretty amazing – checkout his video:
Hope you all have a Happy Easter
*Shuffles papers*
