‘No study has disputed safety of smoke-free devices’

 Robert Egbe

THERE is no research showing that smoke-free devices are unsafe, a researcher, Ndubuisi Kalu, has said.

Kalu said a 2019 study by University of California scientists which stated otherwise, had been disproved.

He made his claims in an article ‘Smoke or vape: The growing public health debate’.

He observed that there is a global debate over cigarette smoking and smoke-free alternatives, such as e-cigarettes, which are being presented by tobacco companies as safer options for smokers.

According to him, the real duty before governments is to invest heavily in the welfare of the people, especially in nutrition and health-care delivery.

Kalu said: “there has been no conclusive study disputing the safety of smoke-free devices.

“The closest was the research by University of California scientists Stanton Glantz and Dharma Bhatta, published in the Journal of American Heart Association, JAHA, which concluded that conventional cigarettes and vapers carried similar risk, with an increased likelihood of a heart attack when both are used.

“The study was originally published on June 5, 2019, and concluded that the use of conventional and electronic cigarettes carried similar risks while doing both at the same time was an even more dangerous option that could increase the likelihood of having a heart attack.”

He noted that this conclusion then called into question the assertion by the tobacco industry that the new smoke-free devices were an alternative with the potential to reduce the damage caused by consuming cigarettes for the more than 1 billion smokers in the world.

He added that “after much criticism and after eight months of pressure from the scientific community, the editors of the magazine accepted their error and retracted.

“They stated that the study could have been based on misleading data, concluding that it did not take into account certain information from a population assessment survey on tobacco and health, very relevant to the research.”

Kalu suggested that by modifying its position, JAHA confirmed that the conclusions were “unreliable.”

“Much of the information shared in the report did not have adequate scientific methodologies, internationally recognized practices and validated scientific teams,” he added.