21 billion reasons to ban ecigs

[James]

Also, think about this... a lot of us are ex smokers gone to vaping... We are still going to have some kind of later in life effect from the years of damage we've done to our bodies. The NHS is still paying to clean up our mistake while more and more people are converting to vaping. So the revenue income is going to dwindle while the cost of healthcare is going to relatively stay the same (when it comes to smoking related illnesses) We may be prolonging the inevitable, but the bill is still going to be there when it is said and done.

The gap however small or large over the next 10, 15, 20 years is going to have to be covered until real cigs are a thing of the past and vaping is the only available option (once more clinical studies show the risk from vaping is significantly less than smoking)...

Am I making sense or is this my over-active imagination again?

Or alternatively we won't die of smoking related diseases, and will instead die of more expensive old age diseases, which in the long run will lead to an increase in costs for the NHS. (Those who calculate the cost of smoking diseases to the NHS always seem to forget that we will eventually die of something!)

 

[Mark]

Or alternatively we won't die of smoking related diseases, and will instead die of more expensive old age diseases, which in the long run will lead to an increase in costs for the NHS. (Those who calculate the cost of smoking diseases to the NHS always seem to forget that we will eventually die of something!)

An excellent point well made and something I haven't thought through before so cheers for that . We are soooo used to hearing how much smokers cost the NHS but is a smoker who contracts cancer in his 50s and dies within 2 yrs of presumably expensive chemo and other therapies etc costing us more than the non smoker who lives into his 80s after hip replacement, osteoporosis, dementia, strokes,Alzheimer's and other age related illnesses with all the associated costs of treatment and care? Hmm food for thought

 

[Doodlebug]

It certainly is food for thought, and something I have been thinking about increasingly in recent months.

FWIW, I have had the legal arguments drawn up about the economic situation regarding taxing ecigs for years now, and remain ready to fight to my last dying breath to prevent a 'sin' tax being applied to ecigs. And this is a useful extra 'strand' to that line of defense, as it were.

It is also very personal for me right now: my own father has dementia. He is 80, my mother 79. She has had a hip replacement, has asthma, diabetes, and is in constant pain. My father was recently hospitalised following a heart scare. He has already had a triple bypass and has a pacemaker fitted.

As much as I love my parents, I can't help but look at their increasingly awful situation as they get older and frailer (thanks to the 'wonders' of modern medicine) and frankly, I feel relieved that my leukemia will come back at some point and prevent my reaching such a 'ripe old age'.

It's a series of sobering thoughts.

Ultimately, I believe that vaping is better than smoking - by every measure possible. Non-smokers are being kept alive far longer than they used to be (and probably longer than they should, really); smokers, too, if they contract cancer, are made to suffer horrible indignities by being put through treatment protocols which are worse than the disease itself! (I speak from very bitter personal experience on that one, having watched my late husband go through an extra 6 months of utter misery, because the doctors insisted on treating him when he was clearly terminal on diagnosis!)

At least with vaping, we get quality of life along the way - and that, I believe, is key to the whole debate.

Just my (rather morbid!) two penn'orth!

Happy vaping one and all!

Cheers,

Katherine