Copy Editor Sabree Blackmon claims e-cig ban is justified
By: SABREE BLACKMON
Copy Editor
E a r l i e r this month, an STLCC c a m p u s – wide ban of tobacco use was extended to electronic cigarettes.
While I do have a libertarian streak, I support smoke-free zones. The case I have seen made supporting the ban is that we still know little about the products and the industries that make them.
That, to me, is enough justification, even if e-cigarettes prove an effective tool to wean people off tobacco.
If we accept the assumption that vapor products are safer to bystanders than cigarettes, that does not mean there is zero public health risk.
It is true that pharmaceuticals utilize vapor as a delivery system. However, that industry is governed by testing and purity standards.
There is also a path of investigation and liability if something goes wrong.
Producers of e-cigarettes are not under similar scrutiny. These companies currently have zero consistent regulation nationally.
While the Federal Drug Administration currently has a proposal for e-cigarette regulation, it is still pending as of today. As such, states themselves have enacted preemptive legislation — the state of Missouri, however, does not currently have any laws passed limiting e-cigarette sale or production according to the American Nonsmokers’ Rights Foundation.
I am hesitant to label any e-cigarette product as safe, given the lack of ingredient disclosure and no quality standards.
There are thousands of new businesses selling vapor products and presenting anything as fact about their safety is intellectual dishonesty.
Just like tobacco cigarettes, e-cigarettes affect the air quality around their users. On a dense campus like STLCC-Meramec, that can blanket a large number of people.
I do not want a lung full of someone else’s oxidized unknowns. I also do not want a contact nicotine buzz from another student’s vapor. If another student gets sick from second-hand exposure or from a product failure, who is held responsible?
E-cigarettes face many of the same safety issues as tobacco and potentially more so, given the unregulated nature of the vapor liquids and the electronics themselves.
Consumers and their buying choices will ultimately force positive changes to the industry. However, until the market sorts itself out, it is a large scale experiment.
I do not want to be a part of this experiment, at least until there’s a resemblance of oversight.
There is a moral failing in that I now have no real opportunity to remove myself from new pollutants produced at whim by industry.
I prefer that we gain more protections to our right to a clean, healthy public environment, not lose them.
I want e-cigarettes eventually to succeed as a safer alternative to tobacco products. Still, I do think STLCC is making a good preemptive step to protect my rights as a student.
Ultimately an e-cigarette user can walk a few feet off campus — I cannot move my classroom to avoid second-hand vapor.
Until there is more transparency to the e-cigarette industry, I think the minor inconveniences are a common sense precaution.
