A massive international study involving nearly 18,000 participants has revealed flavoured vapes are over two times more effective at helping adults to quit smoking than tobacco flavour alone. Further, flavoured vapes don’t lead to more young people smoking.

The study comes as New Zealand’s bill to regulate vaping sits on Parliament’s Order Paper waiting to progress. The bill rules that general retailers, such as dairies, supermarkets, and service stations, would be allowed to sell only three flavours - tobacco, mint and menthol.

“This study overwhelmingly proves flavours help more adults to quit smoking and don’t entice more young people into smoking. Given this compelling research, our MPs now need to amend the bill and retain adult accessibility to popular flavours. Without doubt, flavours are key to New Zealand achieving a smokefree future,” says Ben Pryor, co-owner of VAPO and Alt - the largest Kiwi-owned vape brands.

The study titled ‘Associations of Flavoured e-Cigarette Uptake With Subsequent Smoking Initiation and Cessation’ has been published on Jama Network - Journal of the American Medical Association.

Researchers concluded that ‘favouring flavoured e-cigarettes was not associated with greater youth smoking initiation but was associated with greater adult smoking cessation… the odds of cessation for those favouring non-tobacco flavours were 2.3 times that of those who used tobacco-flavoured e-cigarettes’.

“We just want our Government to follow the evidence, not the emotion. As the researchers conclude ‘increasing smoking cessation among individuals aged 18 to 54 years has substantive implications for population health’. The way to achieve that is to ensure a wide range of vape flavours are available to smokers keen to quit deadly tobacco. Adults love flavours and they work!

“We urgently call on MPs not to let this bill pass in its current form. Yes, to heavy restrictions against youth access and world-leading product safety standards, but no to limiting flavours to just specialist vape stores. That only supports the tobacco industry,” says Mr Pryor.

www.getalt.co.nz

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