Thinking 'bout THR News and Views
Mar 23-Apr 8, 2025
The April Fools Day That Wasn’t A Joke
It has been heartbreaking to watch the cancellation of NIH grants and witness thousands of people lose their jobs. The stress the people affected are under must be overwhelming.
Even those who still have their grants or jobs must feel like they are tiptoeing on eggshells, wondering if they will be the next victim of a cruel axe that seems to have no rhyme or reason for where it falls. As I read DMs, posts, and articles, I can’t help but cry. So many lives… and I dread the fallout from all of this. From the economy to public health, the ramifications will be devastating.
Every human has labels attached to their name. Some describe personality traits, while others identify health issues, appearance, religion, behavior, sex/gender, occupation, etc.
As I work to improve my mental health and to raise my self-esteem, I try to focus on the labels that are positive personality traits. I want to be a good person who gives something valuable to the world. Any day I can make someone smile is a good day.
Towards the end of President Trump’s first term, I started to hear the results of a battery of tests. Tests that would give a name to the struggles I had dealt with most of my life. By the time Biden was sworn in, I had a long list of new labels attached to my name.
Labels that fall into the research areas for which NIH provides grants. Combine the loss of those grants with the effort to disallow the use of some people’s labels, and it feels like we are going back in time. Where the well-being of some of us will no longer matter to the country we call home.
At one time, people with some of my labels were locked up in institutions and never let out. There, they were subjected to horrible abuses that should never happen to a living creature. Their lives were considered an inconvenience to society. They had no value.
Science and compassion changed all that. I am scared AF to see somebody try to stop science, wipe the slate of our identities clean, and not allow others to utter our labels. To take away decades of work to include us in the daily lives of the rest of society is a heartbreaking thing to witness.
My labels are a small portion of the many things researched because of NIH funding. Things that have improved the quality of life, given people hope, and made the world a better place.
I’m scared to see what the future holds. I keep saying it over and over… I am scared. And I can’t find anyone to tell me things will be OK.
Until next time…
P.S. So many icky, chaotic things going on. I feel like roaming the streets and hugging everyone I see. Does anyone want to go on a Hug-A-Thon with me? I continue to believe that LOVE is the answer. I’ll believe that until the day I die. I think that love and kindness have a place in advocacy, too. You can hear me talk about that with Brent Stafford in his latest Regulator Watch piece: SOUL CRUSHING | Vaping Advocacy, Media Scare Tactics & Push To #Bekind. Have a great day, and please #BeKind.
Spreading misinformation:
ProLife Home Care, Inc. “Popcorn Lungs: The Underestimated Risk of Teen Vaping. Vaping is often marketed as the “safer” alternative to smoking. But for teens, it may come with a hidden and irreversible danger: popcorn lungs…If you're in healthcare, public policy, or education—or simply a concerned parent—this is essential reading.”
Consequences of misinformation:
The case of the mother who decided to buy cigarettes to keep her son away from vaping. “The fight against tobacco use has changed shape. Misinformation and simplistic narratives about vaping have left families caught between ethical dilemmas and poorly calibrated public policies. The case of a mother who chose to buy cigarettes for her son to wean him off vaping exposes the deep contradictions of a society that, by demonizing harm reduction tools, condemns younger generations to perpetuate the cycle of dependence and face an uncertain future.”
Pushing back against misinformation:
Myth: Vaping causes Popcorn Lung. Everything you needed to know about vaping and popcorn lung and never knew to ask.
Science Reflective of Real-World Experience is Essential to Effective Tobacco and Vapor Policy. “The bottom line is that we cannot make good policy if we rely on assumptions or preconceived notions. Regulatory agencies should rely on protocols seeking to better reflect real-world experience and usage patterns when evaluating novel nicotine products. And we need more research that explores the direct policy implications of their findings. If we are truly committed to making cigarettes obsolete, our policies must fairly balance harm reduction with potential health concerns, guided first and foremost by accurate and evidence-based science.”
Why Are Smoking Rates Rising in Parts of England? "We know the demand for nicotine is much more resilient than any particular way of taking it,” he continued, “so it is quite possible to see a rebound in smoking if people lose confidence in the safer alternatives.”
New Initiative Takes Aim at Tobacco Harm Reduction Misinformation. “Uptake for the course will have to be substantial to make a dent in THR misperceptions, given just how pervasive these are. Almost 80 percent of doctors worldwide—people whose job it is to present accurate health information—wrongly believe that nicotine causes lung cancer, according to a 2023 survey from Global Action to End Smoking.”
Events that will be discussing misinformation, misperceptions, and disinformation (Please let me know if there are more):
ATNF April 15-17, 2025, Arlington, VA, US
FDLI Annual Conference May 15-16, 2025, Washington, DC, US
E-Cigarette Summit May 19, 2025, Washington, DC, US
GFN June 19-21, 2025, Warsaw, Poland
Pharmaceutical Drug Regulation and Mortality: Evidence from Electronic Cigarettes.
Safer nicotine product taxation and optimal strategies for public health.
Guy Bentley “Tomorrow [April 9] at 10 am, I'll be testifying before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform on how to fix the mess FDA has made of the nicotine market and ensure smokers have legal access to safer alternatives to cigarettes. Watch here”
Chris Bullen “…We need to have a greater sense of urgency about smoking. Smoking is still seen as normal in many societies. It causes premature disability and death and health inequities. Advocating for tobacco endgame policies and offering evidence-based support for more people who smoke to quit is a potentially life-saving intervention and, in my view, an ethical obligation for all health workers.”
Jeffrey Weiss “Dramatic change is coming to FDA’s nicotine and tobacco policy…The new Director’s first action should be to align with the Commissioner on a central policy goal. This was what Mitch Zeller did in 2017 – securing support for a comprehensive nicotine and tobacco plan based on leveraging authorized products to move adults who smoke down the continuum of risk…That “why” should be to remove smoking-related disease as the leading preventable cause of death – saving millions of lives in the process…”
Altmetric (thread) “Copyright, Reuse, Open Access and Culture Academia had an unusual ally in the rise of Open Access and Open Data. This is that story.”
Fresh - Making Smoking History “If I can quit smoking after 60 years, anybody can." “At 73, Alfie from #Gateshead says it's never too late to quit smoking. A lung cancer diagnosis changed everything, and with support from Gateshead Health QUIT Team, he swapped cigarettes for vaping - and quit for good.”
Jeffrey Weiss. “We should hold ourselves to the same standard to which we would subject others. That means that our “tribe” should do what we expect from the other “tribe” – remain open and curious about all emerging science with the goal of responsibly improving the lives of adults who smoke.”
SCOHRE WEBINAR | The evolving regulatory landscape in the EU: Opportunities and Challenges.
Understanding Research Gaps and Priorities for Tobacco Harm Reduction In LMIC's.
AVM. (Video of Dr. Michael Siegel testimony in RI)
Vapes Increasingly Pushed Underground in the US and UK. “Nicotine vaping products are increasingly being pushed underground in two contrasting jurisdictions, as my recent research illustrates. This sends a damaging message about important harm reduction tools, and threatens consumer safety.”
100s Apply for Misinformation Post. “The “unprecedented” number of applications has been fuelled by influencers and KOLs (Key Opinion Leaders) in the vape sector re-posting and sharing the job according to Riot Labs CEO Ben Johnson, who added: “This is all part of our Riot Activist work to stand up for the vape sector and it’s clear the role we’re hiring for has struck a nerve within the industry. People are sick of having vape misinformation shoved down their throats.” (Note: I added this to the post, “The New Study That Isn't”)
Is smoking or vaping worse for you? It depends who’s asking. “Even when the study is published, it’ll only tell us about the effects of vaping on the cardiovascular system, not, notes Boidin, any of the other aspects addressed in some press articles. “I’m not talking about the brain or the lungs,” he says.” (Note: I added this to the post, “The New Study That Isn't”)
VApril Puts Education First. “VApril, “the largest and most successful vape awareness campaign in the world”, is returning for its eighth year amid record-high misperceptions about the stop smoking tool. This year, the UK Vaping Industry Association is placing public education at the top of the agenda.”
An Opportunity for Creating a Better-Regulated Market. “The Trump administration’s chain-saw approach to the status quo may inexplicably cut open a path for more sensible regulation of novel nicotine products and help curb the illicit market.”
Tobacco experts urge EU to regulate nicotine products in a proportionate and risk-based manner. “…with more stringent restrictions on combustion products such as cigarettes and to protect consumers by encouraging them to switch to less harmful products.”
Menthol cigarettes will be banned from April 1. Here’s why – and what else is changing. (Australia) “Retailers have a three-month grace period to sell any old stock already in their stores by July 1.”
Taxes Can Save Lives. “The world remains trapped in smoke. And an uncomfortable question re-emerges with growing urgency in the turbulent landscape of tobacco and nicotine: what if the lives of millions ultimately depended on how taxes are designed and implemented?”
Why does the government hate working-class smokers? “Why would any informed government try to stop someone moving from a dangerous option to a much safer option, especially when the poor among us are so severely punished for being smokers?…The fact is that Labor’s punitive vape and tobacco policy hurts working class people and is a gift for woke, middle class non-smokers.”
E-cigarette sellers say Big Tobacco misrepresented proposed Arizona flavored vape ban. “According to Chanda, a representative for tobacco giant Altria showed up at his shop offering a list of flavored vapes that would be banned under a bill being proposed in the state Legislature. Chanda explained he was told he had to sign something to receive the list.
The next day, he saw the store was officially registered on the Legislature's website as being in support of the bill.”
Commentary: Sen. Ashley Moody’s Vape Misinformation Hurts Public Health. “This hearing underscored the stark reality facing tens of millions of adult vapers and smokers: public health groups and Big Tobacco are both working toward the elimination of independent vaping products—one side seeking an outright ban, while the other fights to maintain a marketplace controlled by a handful of corporations. The result? A policy landscape that could wipe out the consumer-driven innovation that made modern e-cigarettes a powerful harm reduction tool.”
Q&A: Effective interventions and policies to reduce tobacco-caused harm. “The findings from our scientific studies inform the FDA so that they can better regulate products in the best interest of the public’s health. But they also help the public make more informed choices, too, by clarifying the relative harmfulness and benefits of new tobacco products on the market.”
Visit of the Romanian National Institute of Public Health to CoEHAR. “The General Director of INSP, Dr. Simona Parvu, will meet with the leadership of CoEHAR — its founder, Prof. Riccardo Polosa, and its Director, Prof. Giovanni Li Volti — to discuss potential future collaborations aimed at launching projects focused on tobacco harm reduction policies in Romania as well, and to jointly develop new programming lines for the Horizon Europe 2025 Work Programme.”
20 Million Americans Are Hoping Trump Will Save Vaping. “Despite being available in the U.S. marketplace for nearly two decades, e-cigarettes and nicotine vapor products continue to be demonized by public health groups, policymakers, and large swaths of the public. Yet their presence has coincided with a dramatic reduction in combustible cigarette use among American adults…”
LETTER: Proposed Vaping Ban Creates Problems, Not Solutions. “For adults, nicotine vaping is a safer choice. Smoking claims 11,000 Tennessean lives yearly — 4.8 million nationwide over 10 years. Nicotine vaping? Zero deaths in a decade, per CDC and FDA data. Adults use it to quit cigarettes, cutting health risks sharply.”
Beshear signs licensing of nicotine retailers bill into law. “Kentucky will soon begin licensing retailers who sell nicotine, which advocates have said will help regulate an industry and protect minors from addictive chemicals.”
Scientists appeal to the German government at a conference to take the fight against tobacco seriously: "Reducing the smoking rate will be successful if quitting is made possible through switching." “Even though the so-called Tobacco Harm Reduction approach is not yet part of a national health strategy in Germany, numerous scientists at the conference demonstrated how sustainable success can be achieved through quitting using risk-reduced nicotine alternatives such as e-cigarettes or nicotine pouches:”
More news:
Rethinking Bloomberg’s Tobacco Control Influence: A Global Critique. “In February, the World Health Organization’s (WHO) Framework Convention on Tobacco Control(FCTC) celebrated the 20th anniversary of the world’s first public health treaty…While Vital Strategies promotes harm reduction in drug policy – investing in naloxone, safe consumption sites, and drug-checking tools – it lobbies to ban harm-reduction tools for tobacco. Backed by Bloomberg’s funding, the group spends up to $15 million annually pushing such bans in countries like India, Mexico, and the Philippines.”
Teenager pepper sprayed over vape in his backpack. (video) “A teenager is recovering after he was pepper sprayed at Uniontown High School when a vape pen was found in his backpack. KDKA's Ricky Sayer spoke with his family about the incident.” (What is pepper spray, and is it dangerous? “)
Final thoughts…
March was the one-year anniversary of my blog here on Substack. Before that, my THR newsletters were typed up in an email and sent out to a couple of list-servs. Thank you, Eli, for suggesting I use this format for my newsletters to be accessible to more people. Thank you to everyone who takes time out of their busy lives to read my words. Thank you to those who have subscribed. Thank you to everyone who has sent messages with content ideas or words of kindness/appreciation/support.
Notes:
I create these newsletters as a personal project. They are not affiliated with any current or past employers or groups I do volunteer work with. I receive no financial compensation for my efforts to create these newsletters.
My blog, Skip's Corner, has an X/Twitter account. My personal accounts are on BlueSky, LinkedIn, and X (Twitter).