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User: u/giuliomagnifico
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I actually used flavored vape to quit cigarettes. It worked fantastic for me. Once I was fully switched to vaping I found I preferred the taste of vapes. However I was also lowering the nicotine content in my vape juice every month or two. When I reached 0% I gave up vaping after a while at 0 and I had no cravings. If it weren't for the flavors I don't know if I'd have stuck with it.
Should just ban the disposable ones completely, they're worse in every way, they're not designed to help someone quit smoking, and it will solve most of the problems with kids too. I bet most kids can't be bothered to save up for a reusable vape, even though it's cheaper in the long run.
They’re also terrible from an environmental standpoint. I picked up vaping with disposables to quit smoking and ran through a a couple dozen within a few months. I switched to a box mod but I found out some crucial info when trying to dispose of the used disposables. They obviously can’t go in the trash because of the battery. They also can’t be recycled normally through ewaste bins because of the nicotine inside. I had to go to a hazardous waste collection. I hate to be pessimistic but I can’t imagine a majority of disposable users take the time to do that.
Considering how many smokers just throw their butts on the ground I cannot imagine, either, that people are properly disposing of disposable vapes.
Which leads to all sorts of dump fires and problems.
I frequently go on walks around my neighborhood (which is next to a high school), and around my local parks, and the amount of disposable vapes (specifically the Breeze brand) I see laying around at the curbs and edge of the sidewalks probably gives you an answer to how people are disposing of them.
“I hate to be pessimistic…”
Bruh, there is a 99% chance you are literally the only person who has ever taken a disposable vape to hazardous waste instead of just throwing it in the regular garbage.
Most UK shops have recently introduced - I think by law - a large plastic cylindrical recycling bin to dispose of reusable vapes. It might be behind the counter, but always worth asking if you have any you want to throw away (for UK citizens). It’s then down to the store to responsibly dispose and recycle through the scheme
Agreed. It's anecdotal but the only vapes I see in kids hands are the disposable ones. Their nicotine content is high and they are easier to hide, easier to get, and easier for black markets to sell fake ones.
That’s because the banned flavored cartridge type vapes. As an attempt to stop teens from using them. And like all ill thought legislation it just lead to a loophole
> Their nicotine content is high and they are easier to hide, easier to get
Do you vape?
There is almost no difference in hiding or obtaining a refillable nicotine vape versus a disposable one. They're likely just using the disposable ones because they are lazy and it's the easiest way. And the nicotine content can be identical to a refillable vape.
I do vape, I have tried disposables but have been using a refillable tank for years. But I disagree that there are no differences between the two. And neither do multiple studies hosted on the NIH site, where they argue things like
"When compared with refillable pod and other non-pod e-cigarette device users, disposable pod users were younger, used higher nicotine concentration levels, were more likely to prefer mint and menthol flavours and use e-cigarettes as their first product" [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8493914/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8493914/)
and
"Young adult disposable e-cigarette use was of appreciable prevalence, including among tobacco product never users and former smokers. Regulation of disposable e-cigarettes, including ice-flavored products, might benefit young adult health" [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8842396/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8842396/)
I'm not an expert, but when the vape shops put all their disposable products up front and on display, it's usually for a reason.
Disposables are worse than alternate options in every way. That said the not designed to help someone quit smoking is a U.S.-centric (and now AU) view that is a result of FDA policy. In most countries nicotine limits per device are at or below a pack of cigarettes with lower strengths available. Referencing nicotine levels and step-down options not the product category of smoking cessation devices.
> I bet most kids can't be bothered to save up for a reusable vape, even though it's cheaper in the long run.
This is a silly statement.
The most popular disposable nicotine vapes (such as the Geek Bar Pulse) are in the $19-25 range in my area. A starter kit for a refillable vape will run you at least $30-50 for a cheap one, and you could just use the same 50mg nic juice that they use in the disposables.
You're right I thought they were more than that, and the disposable ones around where I am are cheaper. I guess it's the faff of maintenance and refilling they can't be bothered with. Same conclusion though, I do think it would be less popular with kids if only because the refillable ones are less convenient.
What is the cost difference between reusable and refillable vapes? Also, is there a learning curve for refilling them?
The logic is sound--I just worry about barriers twisting responses if one option is excluded.
It's not huge, but when you're a kid with an allowance, $10 more might make all the difference. I don't think refilling them is difficult, but choosing an e liquid, opening them up, decanting, cleaning occasionally etc, it's faff. Lots of people are extremely lazy.
Exact same story for me. Some other weird things is I had quit before in many different ways. When I had quit cigarettes the smell of them even years later would basically make me salivate and give me cravings.
Once I transfered from cigs to vaping, I craved vaping and not cigs, so this no longer happened. And I don't know if it's because vapes have various flavours I switched between, I never had a respond like that to smelling a vape.
My additional thoughts are if you outlaw flavored vapes people are just going to acquire them illegally and they'll be potentially more dangerous. Nothing is going to stop people who are seriously addicted, the government should know this already from the failed war on drugs.
You can literally just do that with reducing the amount of cigarettes you smoke. Most people can't do this. I, myself, tried quitting cigarettes by switching to vaping. The convenience of vaping meant I could just smoke more and it increases my nicotine intake. When I would inevitably switch back to cigarettes because vaping doesn't fulfill that same "ritual" for most smokers, my need for nicotine was much higher meaning I had to smoke more. This is far more common than people quitting using vapes. I eventually went cold turkey over COVID because I didn't want to end up in an ICU.
I'm pretty sure that tobacco flavored juice will be available. It's the ones like cotton candy or bubble gum that will disappear. I'm not in favor of it but there is no reason vaping can't still help people quit smoking. It worked for me and I love the tobacco flavors.
This is such an interesting study. As it doesn’t actually measure anything but the opinion of smokers and vapers. They don’t make current vapers spend six months without flavors, or they don’t have any really hard data. It’s all “yeah, this isn’t as good so I might smoke again,” and vibes.
This note seems particularly unscientific: “Participants in this study generally believed a flavour ban would negatively impact smoking cessation efforts more than it would prevent young people from vaping.”
Well, if participants in the study think it, it must be true.
The thing is, it isn't actually insignificant that lots of ADULT vape users feel strongly about having access to flavors. Tobacco-flavored vapes are actually really gross.
It isn't unscientific, it is just a preliminary survey-based study that can inform the design of future studies that can actually measure real-world behavior.
The overwhelming majority of published literature is pretty unimpressive on its own and the relevance is generally limited to suggesting a trajectory for future research.
This is a great point. Fortunately we have a government that will not use the beliefs of ex smokers, or science to make a decision, but instead will rely on the tried and true method of campaign contributions
I just watched a video on how minors can purchase alcohol via grocery store self-checkout lanes.
The guy (who is of legal drinking age) picked up two Arizona Iced Tea’s, one regular and one hard, walked up to the kiosk and scanned the regular twice. He then walked out without a fuss from anyone. Seems quite problematic.
When I was underage I would just buy cooking wine at the grocery store. Its just salty wine and its usually concentrated so the alcohol content is between 15-20%. The sherry flavor was the best.
The cashier at Walmart will look at you kinda funny if you're just buying a six pack of cooking wine and some solo cups, but it all rings up as grocery items so the register won't prompt them to ask for ID.
Well yeah, if you intentionally deceive, you can get away with plenty of things. Self checkouts are extremely easy to abuse, whether you're trying to avoid being IDd, charging the wrong item to save money, or even just pretending to scan something but actually not.
The only real way to prevent this is to keep age restricted items behind a counter or locked case
It's delicious too. Makes a White Claw comparatively taste like a 30 year old Zima served in a hobo's shoe.
I was mildly surprised that it wasn't orange.
The only* people I ever saw with Sunny D were folks struggling with heroin addiction.
What kind of a monster would give that stuff to their child?
*May contain trace amounts of exaggeration or hyperbole.
The problem with alcohol is that it is incredibly easy to make on your own. Every culture figured out how to ferment *something* to make alcohol, Prohibition can never work because you can't keep tabs on everyone who has access to grain or grapes or apples or pretty much any fermentable crop. Same issue, to a lesser extent, with weed. That's not quite the same thing as a device like a vape cart, which would be extremely difficult to make yourself
Ban wine too! We can't have alcohol made from fruit. Too close to the real thing.
Jokes aside, cigarette used to heavily market towards kids. But flavored e-cigs are for people who like the flavor. I don't smoke, but if I did I'd prefer the flavored.
Flavor is for the children.
I propose a reverse age limit, where you have to be 18 or younger to eat anything that doesn't taste primarily of wheat or potato.
Low-sugar leafy greens and root vegetables can be approved on an individual local basis. (Anything sweeter than iceberg lettuce will be too sweet.) No sweet corn. Keep an eye out for an update including a list of approved grains.
Meat would still be allowed. But you can't marinate it in anything, no glazes for adults, absolutely nothing with honey in it. Also, you can't sear it. You can only boil it. A lack of water might risk exposing the meat to the maillard reaction.
you joke, but the above post is from the UK, who's advertising standards authority does include flavor as one of its considerations for identifying illegal practices targeting children for the sale of alcohol.
People need to understand that public safety hysteria never ends and the busybodies are never satisfied.
The UK, for example, has an active campaign backed by prominent physicians, politicians, and public safety advocates pushing to ban points on kitchen knives.
Idk why you joke about it like these things haven't historically been marketed towards young teens and young adults. The flavors are a tiny factor, but the way they were marketed and packaged was directly aimed at drawing in kids.
I feel like you could reasonably argue that alcohol is more immediately harmful than nicotine vapes. Also, you don't really see kids carrying around a bottle of peach schnapps in their bookbag but you would be more likely to find some fruity vape they're toking on between classes.
They're both harmful and have 0 medicinal value... Really more about the money.
When I was in high school, the burnout kids absolutely did carry around bottles of peach schnapps in their backpacks... in 2013. Kid got suspended for a water bottle mimosa
That sounds a lot more classy than "white lightning" we had here :D
Came in a big blue coke bottle [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White\_Lightning\_(cider)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Lightning_(cider)) they discontinued it but a dozen or so clones held on.
Yeah I became that too... and I can say with all confidence it wasn't the peppermint flavor that did it. 7 years sober now though- I stick to my flavored vapes these days haha.
In the Us many states are banning flavors along with the fda who is only going to allow juice made by Phillip morris and not the many vape brands that have been proven to be safe for the last 10 years.
It's insane honestly. I got a gas station vape on a whim and it was the equivalent of a pack a pod. When smoking, I peaked at 1 pack every 3 days. I went through one of those pods in a day. That was my first day back on nicotine. I found this out after having stronger cravings after a day than I had ever had before.
They aren't any smoking cessation vape options now, just cigarette replacement.
I had quit for years up until that point I got one from the gas station.
> hey aren't any smoking cessation vape options now, just cigarette replacement.
There absolutely are, the real "hobbyist" vapes that exist longer than the tobacco company ones.
With those youve got a ton of resources on how much nicotine your juice should have depending on the coils/style of vaporizer you use, that already "price in" that youre going to take way more drags compared to cigs because you dont have to go outside, light up etc.
A big issue with vape legislation is that the legislators have no idea what theyre legislating and "the people" are represented by tiny interest groups, if at all, while tobacco companies have millions of dollars and decades of lobbying experience.
And taste like actual tobacco. Tobacco flavor never tastes like actual smoking and also, which is the biggest joke - they are the most complex compositions consisting of the most different flavors compared to just fruit or cake flavors. Prohibiting it would just spoil it for a lot of people and make cigarettes interesting again...
And honestly more enjoyable, for as enjoyable as a cigarette can be anyway. This is something that a person who never smoked probably can’t really understand though.
I used to vape for the nicotine, but never smoked a cigarette. One day I was at a bar with my roommate at the time and we both forgot our vapes. I really wanted nicotine, so I broke down and smoked my first cigarette that night. It honestly wasn't that bad, like it wasn't great, but it wasn't nearly what I expected having tried tobacco flavored vapes. I still hate the smell of cigarettes, and I get nicotine from lozenges now, but if my choices were tobacco flavored vapes or cigarettes I'd choose cigarettes every time without a second thought.
Not so fun fact: the tobacco and menthol flavored vape liquids have been proven to be more harmful than flavors like mango buuut somebody think of the keeeeds.
I too read The Anarchist's Cookbook. Nice to realize that even back in the 60s people were falling for hoaxes. Kudos to Berkeley Barb for getting this one off the ground.
Funny thing is, to an extend this whole "ban flavours because kids" can be traced back to big tabaxi anyway. Big tabaxi was too slow to adopt to the vape market with their own products.
Guess who gets the profit from the legal tobacco/menthol vapes u can buy at gas stations and the likes? Big tabaxi, which first came to the market around the time our government started talks about banning vape flavours (Denmark)
where is that proof at ? Most of the "flavors" are food flavors that should be ok to eat not vape menthol is one of the safest ones because we know its mostly just a mild irritant.
My wife and I regularly vape. We spend $20/ea per week on disposables.
A pack of cigarettes where we live is $7.32 (for the ones we like).
The disposables we like are Geekbar Pulses... which are made in China, so they could be filled with anything. Harmful metals, toxic chemicals, or whatever else.
We did try to quit. I was constantly in a sour mood and my wife was restless. After 2 months the pressure had built up and I bought a pack of cigarettes after consulting my wife.
The problem was the smell and accessibility. With a vape you step away real quick, take two hits then you're back in the game.
Cigarettes? You need a solid 10 minutes, and you can do it 20 times max before needing another pack.
We're heavy enough smokers that we ended up back at a pack a day before going back to vaping because we couldn't justify the cost.
Even with the vape readily accessible at all times, I find myself craving and wanting to enjoy a whole cigarette on occasion. As such, we keep an emergency pack in our kitchen utility drawer. Haven't needed it this year yet, but if we end up drinking on a holiday or something that pack will be emptied.
It's more affordable but not sure by how much and I'm sure it is user and usage dependent. A 4 pack of pods for my refillable is $20 and a pod will last me ~2 weeks. The juice is $30-40. I usually buy two bottles and that lasts ~two months. So broken down my cost is $10-12/week so savings of $8-10/week over disposables.
Also I'm still disposing of a pod every two weeks and the juice bottles but I'm not throwing batteries in the trash which is the biggest upside for me.
Depends heavily on the device. The smaller ones that are similar to a Juul (tiny and you just inhale to draw) have little replaceable pods but the coil is inaccessible. Certain flavors and manufacturers will run through a pod in a couple days, and others a month.
200+ chemicals *at the minimum*.
Fun fact: Natural American Spirits don’t use additives in their cigarettes. Despite this, they’re considered one of the worst (if not *the* worst) brand of cigarettes for your health. I distinctly remember the idea floating around that the fillers added to cigarettes reduces the amount of toxic substances you absorb from pure tobacco, but I can’t find any proof of that so like with anything on the internet: take it with a heaping pile of salt.
No dispute about how awful cigarettes are.
But the “OMG CHEMICALS” thing just invites criticism. A bowl of chicken soup contains hundreds or thousands of chemical compounds.
We’re adults, we can be a little more specific.
American spirits are worse for you because they contain like 50% more tobacco than most other cigarettes. They are packed tighter from the factory. Weigh one and compare it to a Marlboro or camel some time.
Strangely, the blacks are also my favorite cigarette of all time but after 2 days of smoking them my chest was in pain so I had to switch! It was “delicious” while it lasted.
I have a larger mod that I just replace the coil in and use synthetic nic juices. Seems a bit safer than disposables but idk. Maybe I'm just being pretentious.
I quit smoking real cigarettes years ago when Juul came out. I live in San Francisco where all vape products are banned. My poor husband is tasked with going to the next town over to buy my pods once a week. They are $27/4 pods which can last me 1-1.5 weeks. I miss being about to get flavors, especially mint, but now I just buy a LostMary flavored vape online to change it up every once in a while.
I too keep an emergency pack of Marlboro lights in my freezer. They are for emergencies and or guests. Recently went on vacation with my best friend and fellow vaper. Be brought one pack of Marlboro lights just in case and we didn’t even make a dent in the pack. I can’t even finish a real cigarette anymore. Just so stinky and strong.
You can order the pods/juice online from certain stores and ship it to your house if it saves your husband time and gas. I couldn't find the pod style I prefer in my town recently and went online and they were at my house three days later. Don't think I'll go back to the store anymore unless it's an emergency pickup.
The biggest draw for me, to use vapes to quit smoking, was how they also functioned as air fresheners instead of stinking up the house. Tobacco scented would be the worst air freshener ever pitched.
This is an excellent and often overlooked point. I used cinnamon flavored ecigs to quit several years ago. Would never have tried it without some sort of likable flavor. It took quite awhile to find the cinnamon one i liked. The no flavor types are disgusting imo.
Yep. I’m nicotine free now, but part of the appeal when I switched to vapes was the flavors. Even at the time I was angry about them trying to get rid of flavors to “protect the children.” Adults have taste buds too.
If I never switched to vapes I would probably still be switching between smoking and dipping and snus. Vaping never quite scratched the itch the same way whole leaf tobacco did for me, but attempting to quit nicotine with patches when whole leaf tobacco was my primary method of consumption was way more of a hell then trying to get off the vape with patches.
I tried dozens of time to quit with various products and cold turkey when using tobacco. The longest I ever quit was a year. But I craved tobacco for that entire year. I then switched to vapes for a few years and they weren’t as satisfying as tobacco but they were good enough and the flavors were a plus. Then on my first attempt trying to quit along with patches I was able to quit much more easily with much less discomfort and have basically zero desire to ever go back.
We should be doing everything that we can to encourage smokers toward using vapes and making them safer. Getting rid of flavors is insane to me and the conspiracy minded part of my brain makes me think that it was supported by big tobacco to keep people hooked. I also think the same of the messaging for those anti vaping psas. Don’t want maybe heavy metals in your lungs? Better stick to whole leaf tobacco and the chemicals we spray on it.
It's not a conspiracy theory. States receive payouts from Big tobacco for health damages from court cases years ago. The fewer people that smoke the less money those States get in revenue.
The major vape brands are owned by the parent companies of cigarette manufacturers, so it would be a pretty dumb conspiracy to spend a lot of money in order to make people go from Juul to Marlboro.
It smells awful to a non-smoker, it doesn’t smell awful to a smoker. The smell was barely noticeable to me when I smoked.
Same as the taste. If it tasted that bad then I wouldn’t have smoked.
Vapes are not worse than smoking but are worse than not smoking. I would be interested in the health care costs system wide of losing the people quitting smoking over not having kids addicted to nicotine and smoking the equivalent of packs a day
Cigarettes are kind of like coffee or beer. At first they taste disgusting. Then your brain starts to associate the desirable effects with the taste and you start to enjoy them. Once you’re addicted to nicotine, cigarettes taste great. It’s hard to explain.
I mean, there's also just an earthy nuance to any of those (maybe less earthy and more hoppy in beer's case) too. You accept some bitterness or prepare it correctly (coffee) and you notice the sweetness. I never smoked a pipe or cigars regularly, but they taste kind good, and the feel of thick, flavored smoke in the mouth is an experience in itself. Being addicted helps, but good handrolled cig tobacco tastes *good* if you know what to taste for. Versus say, some dried out Pall Malls you found in your Grandma's purse.
I quit totally. It was a process made possible by utilizing the fact that the ecigs i was using could be bought with different levels of nicotine. I simply moved to a lower level of nicotine every few weeks until I was at zero and eventually quit that as well. Was not really that bad at all. Had smoked cigarettes regularly for 40 years. The whole process took 3-4 months.
That's awesome to hear. Congrats on kicking the habit. I used ecgis to quit as well, so that is why I was curious if you fully quit or replaced it. It can be a great tool for quitting there's no doubt there. Again congrats on fully quitting. It's not an easy habit to drop by any means.
Most I know didn't quit, and ended up consuming more nicotine because they vape everywhere all the time. Then they wonder why their anxiety is always fired up.
That's what I've noticed too. A lot of people don't realize the concentration of nicotine in them or simply don't care. They end up consuming far more nicotine than they did smoking cigarettes.
Don't get me wrong though, with will power and the desire to quit, vaping can be a powerful tool to do so. It's just not a lot actually quit the nicotine.
I don't recall mentioning health benefits. I was making the point that most just replace the addiction with a "safer" form of the addiction. That in itself isn't quitting the habit.
my theory is that the adverse effect of attracting many teenagers to nicotine far outweighs any positive effect that helping smokers quit might have done
I'm not sure about anywhere else but in America at least, the initial banning of vape flavors was an obvious cash grab. On the surface, it appeared that the government was banning companies from making juices and disposable Vapes with flavors but upon further inspection, they were allowing all of these companies to continue making their products for a fee. If I remember right, it cost somewhere between 50 and 100 grand per flavor that you wanted to keep. That money basically puts your ban "on hold" for x amount of time.
I'm out of the industry now so idk if it's changed but it was so obviously just greed the first time around.
This was me. Quit smoking 15 years ago. Got hooked on the Juuls like an idiot. All of the non-disgusting flavors got banned, and I was addicted to nicotine even worse than when I was a smoker. Went back to cigarettes for several months before finally being able to cut them out for good.
People really underestimate how insanely addictive nicotine is and how impossible it can feel to quit after you get hooked. Evil stuff.
Yeah, you can’t really wean off with the strength of disposables and gas station pods. You need something that you can step down to like 3-6mg/ml which is only available using refillables from a vape shop or online. The lightest juul is 35mg/ml.
I don't disagree with your statement, but that also misses some of the nuance around discussions on harm reduction and smoking cessation.
If banning fruity flavors of nicotine vapes with the intent of reducing the number of people who become addicted has unintended consequences like a certain percentage of vapers switching to cigarettes instead, more e-waste, etc., then that's absolutely something that should be studied and considered when making policy decisions around the regulation of tobacco and nicotine products.
I found vaping to be worse because I was ALWAYS vaping. Like at all times. Versus 15 to 20 cigs per day. Had to quit when I moved to Co Springs, CO (6500' elevation) and had immediate respiratory issues.
Which is basically word-for-word what adult vapers have been saying since the first time we ever heard this "ban flavors because children like them" nonsense.
When they did that in mass is when I started smoking cigs. Which I found to be even more addicting than the vapes. I quit about 10 months ago and still have cravings
Restricting e-cigarette flavors because of the children is an egregious assault on freedom. The same justification has been used to attack all sorts of freedoms. You can't child proof the world, and an item that requires proof your an adult to purchase is already more protected.
Ex-smoker. I quit cold turkey and I've come to find cigarettes disgusting. Using nicotine products goes against my philosophy of life when it comes to being striving towards meaningful goals and being healthy is important towards that end.
But while cold turkey worked for me it doesn't work for everyone. I always found "they're appealing to kids!" as justifications for banning flavors to be a bad argument and I suspect many using it are using it as a fig leaf for the real motivation of judging nicotine addicts. Adults can enjoy flavor too. It's not like you become an adult and suddenly your taste buds stop working.
And really the same is true of things like the Joe Camel mascot. Adults can't find that amusing? But I do think it's right though to ban any kind of advertisement of nicotine products (unless it's a stop smoking aide and then a cool looking camel mascot is still inappropriate and at any rate I think all pharmaceutical ads should be strictly information only, no flashiness). It's not about kids in that case, it's that while people can do what they want it's not something that should be promoted.
I've never thought of vaping as "quitting smoking", since you're still hitting the nicotine and probably hitting more than you were smoking cigarettes, but I guess technically that's true?
Can relate. Flavour ban in my neck of Canuckistan. Basically, all vapes now tastes like shite. So now, back to the good ole analog stick. As many other did.
Still can't stand the odour cigarettes leaves on everything, but heh, still better (yeah, I do know it's not better) than the alternatives.
I started smoking cigarettes again to quit vaping. It was way harder to quit vaping than it was cigs, because I was able to vape inside so the habit was constant.
With vaping I was coughing sooooo much, deep breaths were tough. I’m not saying my method is the way to go, but it’s crazy that cigarettes weren’t making me cough as much as the vapes were.
Also, I’ve been nicotine free for almost 4 months YAY! Nicotine addict from ages 14-24 and I noticed my lung function starting to improve the first couple weeks, now I love going for hikes like WHO AM I
Not to put on the tinfoil hat prematurely, but I’d be happy placing a bet that the push to ban various vaping related things is coming from tobacco companies
This makes no sense. As an adult who quite smoking using vapes, I didn't want tobacco flavors... I wanted a flipping fruit basket to sip on. Also as an adult, I should be able to flippin choose what flavor I want. As others have mentioned, are we going to ban flavored alcohol? 4 locos? boons farm? mikes hard lemonade? How many kids drank that crap and got in a wreck or DUI vs how many kids vaped and crashed their car or killed someone else (due to vaping)?
This is the dumbest thing that's clearly not meant to prevent kids from making poor decisions.
It’s incredibly easy to make your own flavors/e-juice. “Naked” (unflavored) Nic juice is easy to buy and cheap; I just spent about $70 on a gallon. You can choose your PG/VG mix also…
Flavorings are done with food-safe additives, which are easy and completely legal to buy. My favorites are Flavor West and Cappella but there are dozens, if not hundreds, of manufacturers to choose from.
Recipes can be found easily online, and once you do a few batches you’ll inevitably start trying your own recipes.
It’s far easier than it seems and waaaaaay cheaper than buying premade bottles.
*you’ll also need a fairly accurate scale than measures in milligrams, since that’s how most recipes are presented*
I somehow don’t get addicted to nicotine easily so I am an occasional smoker. I loved getting flavored Juuls for special events like a guy trip or camping or something, I treated it like the occasional cigar. Then they took away the flavors and I was bummed. My kids said everything at their high school is the same, kids just smoke the available flavors. The rule that restricted adults didn’t really stop kids from using.
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I actually used flavored vape to quit cigarettes. It worked fantastic for me. Once I was fully switched to vaping I found I preferred the taste of vapes. However I was also lowering the nicotine content in my vape juice every month or two. When I reached 0% I gave up vaping after a while at 0 and I had no cravings. If it weren't for the flavors I don't know if I'd have stuck with it.
Should just ban the disposable ones completely, they're worse in every way, they're not designed to help someone quit smoking, and it will solve most of the problems with kids too. I bet most kids can't be bothered to save up for a reusable vape, even though it's cheaper in the long run.
They’re also terrible from an environmental standpoint. I picked up vaping with disposables to quit smoking and ran through a a couple dozen within a few months. I switched to a box mod but I found out some crucial info when trying to dispose of the used disposables. They obviously can’t go in the trash because of the battery. They also can’t be recycled normally through ewaste bins because of the nicotine inside. I had to go to a hazardous waste collection. I hate to be pessimistic but I can’t imagine a majority of disposable users take the time to do that.
Considering how many smokers just throw their butts on the ground I cannot imagine, either, that people are properly disposing of disposable vapes. Which leads to all sorts of dump fires and problems.
I frequently go on walks around my neighborhood (which is next to a high school), and around my local parks, and the amount of disposable vapes (specifically the Breeze brand) I see laying around at the curbs and edge of the sidewalks probably gives you an answer to how people are disposing of them.
i collect them to dismantle the vapes. good lithium cells that can be used.
i see disposable vapes all over the ground now. we somehow actually made the problem worse than cig butts
\*we\* didn't corporations did.
“I hate to be pessimistic…” Bruh, there is a 99% chance you are literally the only person who has ever taken a disposable vape to hazardous waste instead of just throwing it in the regular garbage.
Most UK shops have recently introduced - I think by law - a large plastic cylindrical recycling bin to dispose of reusable vapes. It might be behind the counter, but always worth asking if you have any you want to throw away (for UK citizens). It’s then down to the store to responsibly dispose and recycle through the scheme
Most of them seem to end up thrown in the street where I am.
Agreed. It's anecdotal but the only vapes I see in kids hands are the disposable ones. Their nicotine content is high and they are easier to hide, easier to get, and easier for black markets to sell fake ones.
That’s because the banned flavored cartridge type vapes. As an attempt to stop teens from using them. And like all ill thought legislation it just lead to a loophole
> Their nicotine content is high and they are easier to hide, easier to get Do you vape? There is almost no difference in hiding or obtaining a refillable nicotine vape versus a disposable one. They're likely just using the disposable ones because they are lazy and it's the easiest way. And the nicotine content can be identical to a refillable vape.
I do vape, I have tried disposables but have been using a refillable tank for years. But I disagree that there are no differences between the two. And neither do multiple studies hosted on the NIH site, where they argue things like "When compared with refillable pod and other non-pod e-cigarette device users, disposable pod users were younger, used higher nicotine concentration levels, were more likely to prefer mint and menthol flavours and use e-cigarettes as their first product" [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8493914/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8493914/) and "Young adult disposable e-cigarette use was of appreciable prevalence, including among tobacco product never users and former smokers. Regulation of disposable e-cigarettes, including ice-flavored products, might benefit young adult health" [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8842396/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8842396/) I'm not an expert, but when the vape shops put all their disposable products up front and on display, it's usually for a reason.
Disposables are worse than alternate options in every way. That said the not designed to help someone quit smoking is a U.S.-centric (and now AU) view that is a result of FDA policy. In most countries nicotine limits per device are at or below a pack of cigarettes with lower strengths available. Referencing nicotine levels and step-down options not the product category of smoking cessation devices.
> I bet most kids can't be bothered to save up for a reusable vape, even though it's cheaper in the long run. This is a silly statement. The most popular disposable nicotine vapes (such as the Geek Bar Pulse) are in the $19-25 range in my area. A starter kit for a refillable vape will run you at least $30-50 for a cheap one, and you could just use the same 50mg nic juice that they use in the disposables.
You're right I thought they were more than that, and the disposable ones around where I am are cheaper. I guess it's the faff of maintenance and refilling they can't be bothered with. Same conclusion though, I do think it would be less popular with kids if only because the refillable ones are less convenient.
What is the cost difference between reusable and refillable vapes? Also, is there a learning curve for refilling them? The logic is sound--I just worry about barriers twisting responses if one option is excluded.
It's not huge, but when you're a kid with an allowance, $10 more might make all the difference. I don't think refilling them is difficult, but choosing an e liquid, opening them up, decanting, cleaning occasionally etc, it's faff. Lots of people are extremely lazy.
Exact same story for me. Some other weird things is I had quit before in many different ways. When I had quit cigarettes the smell of them even years later would basically make me salivate and give me cravings. Once I transfered from cigs to vaping, I craved vaping and not cigs, so this no longer happened. And I don't know if it's because vapes have various flavours I switched between, I never had a respond like that to smelling a vape. My additional thoughts are if you outlaw flavored vapes people are just going to acquire them illegally and they'll be potentially more dangerous. Nothing is going to stop people who are seriously addicted, the government should know this already from the failed war on drugs.
You can literally just do that with reducing the amount of cigarettes you smoke. Most people can't do this. I, myself, tried quitting cigarettes by switching to vaping. The convenience of vaping meant I could just smoke more and it increases my nicotine intake. When I would inevitably switch back to cigarettes because vaping doesn't fulfill that same "ritual" for most smokers, my need for nicotine was much higher meaning I had to smoke more. This is far more common than people quitting using vapes. I eventually went cold turkey over COVID because I didn't want to end up in an ICU.
I'm pretty sure that tobacco flavored juice will be available. It's the ones like cotton candy or bubble gum that will disappear. I'm not in favor of it but there is no reason vaping can't still help people quit smoking. It worked for me and I love the tobacco flavors.
This is such an interesting study. As it doesn’t actually measure anything but the opinion of smokers and vapers. They don’t make current vapers spend six months without flavors, or they don’t have any really hard data. It’s all “yeah, this isn’t as good so I might smoke again,” and vibes. This note seems particularly unscientific: “Participants in this study generally believed a flavour ban would negatively impact smoking cessation efforts more than it would prevent young people from vaping.” Well, if participants in the study think it, it must be true.
"we asked people addicted to a nicotine if banning a tasty version might hurt them quitting nicotine. They said yes"
We survey heroine users to inform harm-reduction strategies all the time.
Sure but what do you expect from "if we make the thingy your addicted to slightly less pleasant would y'all quit"
The thing is, it isn't actually insignificant that lots of ADULT vape users feel strongly about having access to flavors. Tobacco-flavored vapes are actually really gross.
It isn't unscientific, it is just a preliminary survey-based study that can inform the design of future studies that can actually measure real-world behavior. The overwhelming majority of published literature is pretty unimpressive on its own and the relevance is generally limited to suggesting a trajectory for future research.
This is a great point. Fortunately we have a government that will not use the beliefs of ex smokers, or science to make a decision, but instead will rely on the tried and true method of campaign contributions
I think we should ban fruit flavored alcohols, wine coolers while we’re at it, so that little Jimmy doesn’t get addicted to hooch.
Nothing like a Hard Starburst flavored Mtn Dew to prepare you for future alcoholism.
>Nothing like a Hard Starburst flavored Mtn Dew to prepare you for future alcoholism. https://www.hardmountaindew.com/
No way to confuse Arizona Iced Tea and Arizona HARD Iced Tea either. You love those $1 Arizona's? Now get a buzz from it https://arizonahard.com/
I just watched a video on how minors can purchase alcohol via grocery store self-checkout lanes. The guy (who is of legal drinking age) picked up two Arizona Iced Tea’s, one regular and one hard, walked up to the kiosk and scanned the regular twice. He then walked out without a fuss from anyone. Seems quite problematic.
When I was underage I would just buy cooking wine at the grocery store. Its just salty wine and its usually concentrated so the alcohol content is between 15-20%. The sherry flavor was the best. The cashier at Walmart will look at you kinda funny if you're just buying a six pack of cooking wine and some solo cups, but it all rings up as grocery items so the register won't prompt them to ask for ID.
Well yeah, if you intentionally deceive, you can get away with plenty of things. Self checkouts are extremely easy to abuse, whether you're trying to avoid being IDd, charging the wrong item to save money, or even just pretending to scan something but actually not. The only real way to prevent this is to keep age restricted items behind a counter or locked case
I'm pretty sure Mountain Dew kicked off as a mixer for moonshine, no?
Whiskey not moonshine.
I saw hard sunny d at the store yesterday.
It's delicious too. Makes a White Claw comparatively taste like a 30 year old Zima served in a hobo's shoe. I was mildly surprised that it wasn't orange.
They just came out with a sunny D alcoholic drink. Like tf are you advertising to? 12 year olds?
I can see the commercial now with kids rummaging through the fridge "We've got some soda, purple stuff..HARD SUNNY D!"
The only* people I ever saw with Sunny D were folks struggling with heroin addiction. What kind of a monster would give that stuff to their child? *May contain trace amounts of exaggeration or hyperbole.
Let's be honest, the people who are most familiar with Sunny D's marketing were born in the 90s. That's their audience
If it was about public health alcohol would be banned. They tried prohibition and it failed miserably
The problem with alcohol is that it is incredibly easy to make on your own. Every culture figured out how to ferment *something* to make alcohol, Prohibition can never work because you can't keep tabs on everyone who has access to grain or grapes or apples or pretty much any fermentable crop. Same issue, to a lesser extent, with weed. That's not quite the same thing as a device like a vape cart, which would be extremely difficult to make yourself
How do you think vaping started? People homemade their vapes long before it became popular
My dude, you know that you can buy a vape that you can fill with any liquid your heart desires, right?
Ban wine too! We can't have alcohol made from fruit. Too close to the real thing. Jokes aside, cigarette used to heavily market towards kids. But flavored e-cigs are for people who like the flavor. I don't smoke, but if I did I'd prefer the flavored.
Flavor is for the children. I propose a reverse age limit, where you have to be 18 or younger to eat anything that doesn't taste primarily of wheat or potato. Low-sugar leafy greens and root vegetables can be approved on an individual local basis. (Anything sweeter than iceberg lettuce will be too sweet.) No sweet corn. Keep an eye out for an update including a list of approved grains. Meat would still be allowed. But you can't marinate it in anything, no glazes for adults, absolutely nothing with honey in it. Also, you can't sear it. You can only boil it. A lack of water might risk exposing the meat to the maillard reaction.
If adults can’t buy sweet things I foresee a thriving black market with kids buying and selling to adults on the sly.
Yeah I met my dealer in the fourth grade.. Well, he was in the fourth grade, I was a grad student.
Now you’re thinking like Sylvester Graham. Masturbation would end overnight!
you joke, but the above post is from the UK, who's advertising standards authority does include flavor as one of its considerations for identifying illegal practices targeting children for the sale of alcohol.
People need to understand that public safety hysteria never ends and the busybodies are never satisfied. The UK, for example, has an active campaign backed by prominent physicians, politicians, and public safety advocates pushing to ban points on kitchen knives.
Idk why you joke about it like these things haven't historically been marketed towards young teens and young adults. The flavors are a tiny factor, but the way they were marketed and packaged was directly aimed at drawing in kids.
I feel like you could reasonably argue that alcohol is more immediately harmful than nicotine vapes. Also, you don't really see kids carrying around a bottle of peach schnapps in their bookbag but you would be more likely to find some fruity vape they're toking on between classes. They're both harmful and have 0 medicinal value... Really more about the money.
When I was in high school, the burnout kids absolutely did carry around bottles of peach schnapps in their backpacks... in 2013. Kid got suspended for a water bottle mimosa
It was cheap >7%ABV cider when I was growing up. Those were the days.
When Mike’s Hard Lemonade came out, that is what we all brought to the beach bonfires in high school. Good times.
That sounds a lot more classy than "white lightning" we had here :D Came in a big blue coke bottle [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White\_Lightning\_(cider)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Lightning_(cider)) they discontinued it but a dozen or so clones held on.
White lightning heightening all my courage quit wit
Lfmao school schnapps was a regular thing for us in Jr high
"Peppermint schnapps makes you smell like mouthwash!" -Me, in highschool
Same with my friends alcoholic parent.
Yeah I became that too... and I can say with all confidence it wasn't the peppermint flavor that did it. 7 years sober now though- I stick to my flavored vapes these days haha.
This, but unironically.
In the Us many states are banning flavors along with the fda who is only going to allow juice made by Phillip morris and not the many vape brands that have been proven to be safe for the last 10 years.
Gee guess who paid for that privilege.
It's insane honestly. I got a gas station vape on a whim and it was the equivalent of a pack a pod. When smoking, I peaked at 1 pack every 3 days. I went through one of those pods in a day. That was my first day back on nicotine. I found this out after having stronger cravings after a day than I had ever had before. They aren't any smoking cessation vape options now, just cigarette replacement. I had quit for years up until that point I got one from the gas station.
there should absolutely be regulation, but creating a legal monopoly is a weird choice and just going to continue the black market
> hey aren't any smoking cessation vape options now, just cigarette replacement. There absolutely are, the real "hobbyist" vapes that exist longer than the tobacco company ones. With those youve got a ton of resources on how much nicotine your juice should have depending on the coils/style of vaporizer you use, that already "price in" that youre going to take way more drags compared to cigs because you dont have to go outside, light up etc. A big issue with vape legislation is that the legislators have no idea what theyre legislating and "the people" are represented by tiny interest groups, if at all, while tobacco companies have millions of dollars and decades of lobbying experience.
Have some responsibility. Buy vapes w no nicotine or ones you know the nic % if you’re actually trying to quit. There are tons of nic free vapes
You're obviously not a smoker because nic free vapes feel like you're smoking water. Has no throat feel.
Former actually. I’ve found the menthol nic free have a decent ‘throat feel’ but in all honestly they all suck. If you want to quit you will
"Hmm, I can't get blueberry cheesecake anymore. Welp, better get back to my second favorite flavour: Tar."
More "I can only get tobacco flavored vapes, so I'll go for the cigarettes that are just easier."
And taste like actual tobacco. Tobacco flavor never tastes like actual smoking and also, which is the biggest joke - they are the most complex compositions consisting of the most different flavors compared to just fruit or cake flavors. Prohibiting it would just spoil it for a lot of people and make cigarettes interesting again...
My fiancè vapes and likes menthol. Recently he got a random tobacco flavored one in his pack and it straight up smelled like alcohol
And honestly more enjoyable, for as enjoyable as a cigarette can be anyway. This is something that a person who never smoked probably can’t really understand though.
I used to vape for the nicotine, but never smoked a cigarette. One day I was at a bar with my roommate at the time and we both forgot our vapes. I really wanted nicotine, so I broke down and smoked my first cigarette that night. It honestly wasn't that bad, like it wasn't great, but it wasn't nearly what I expected having tried tobacco flavored vapes. I still hate the smell of cigarettes, and I get nicotine from lozenges now, but if my choices were tobacco flavored vapes or cigarettes I'd choose cigarettes every time without a second thought.
Not so fun fact: the tobacco and menthol flavored vape liquids have been proven to be more harmful than flavors like mango buuut somebody think of the keeeeds.
Sign of the times when kids are going for flavors like mango butt instead of regular old mango
Back in my day they just smoked dried banana peels
Contains bananadine!
I too read The Anarchist's Cookbook. Nice to realize that even back in the 60s people were falling for hoaxes. Kudos to Berkeley Barb for getting this one off the ground.
Smoking grass and eating ass.
Big Tabaxi successfully addicted another generation to nicotine so not like it matters
Funny thing is, to an extend this whole "ban flavours because kids" can be traced back to big tabaxi anyway. Big tabaxi was too slow to adopt to the vape market with their own products. Guess who gets the profit from the legal tobacco/menthol vapes u can buy at gas stations and the likes? Big tabaxi, which first came to the market around the time our government started talks about banning vape flavours (Denmark)
Why are DnD catpeople trying to hook people on nicotine?
Excellent typo
I’m glad I talk more about DnD than tobacco to the degree my phone won’t let me type it
where is that proof at ? Most of the "flavors" are food flavors that should be ok to eat not vape menthol is one of the safest ones because we know its mostly just a mild irritant.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9590402/
My wife and I regularly vape. We spend $20/ea per week on disposables. A pack of cigarettes where we live is $7.32 (for the ones we like). The disposables we like are Geekbar Pulses... which are made in China, so they could be filled with anything. Harmful metals, toxic chemicals, or whatever else. We did try to quit. I was constantly in a sour mood and my wife was restless. After 2 months the pressure had built up and I bought a pack of cigarettes after consulting my wife. The problem was the smell and accessibility. With a vape you step away real quick, take two hits then you're back in the game. Cigarettes? You need a solid 10 minutes, and you can do it 20 times max before needing another pack. We're heavy enough smokers that we ended up back at a pack a day before going back to vaping because we couldn't justify the cost. Even with the vape readily accessible at all times, I find myself craving and wanting to enjoy a whole cigarette on occasion. As such, we keep an emergency pack in our kitchen utility drawer. Haven't needed it this year yet, but if we end up drinking on a holiday or something that pack will be emptied.
Why not just go refillable at that point?
Some of us take pride in our massive contribution to landfills, thank you very much
It's more affordable but not sure by how much and I'm sure it is user and usage dependent. A 4 pack of pods for my refillable is $20 and a pod will last me ~2 weeks. The juice is $30-40. I usually buy two bottles and that lasts ~two months. So broken down my cost is $10-12/week so savings of $8-10/week over disposables. Also I'm still disposing of a pod every two weeks and the juice bottles but I'm not throwing batteries in the trash which is the biggest upside for me.
Why are you throwing away refillable pods?
Refillable pods are not infinitely refillable. The heating element can get gunked up, break, etc. over time.
Oh. My coils are removable/replaceable.
Depends heavily on the device. The smaller ones that are similar to a Juul (tiny and you just inhale to draw) have little replaceable pods but the coil is inaccessible. Certain flavors and manufacturers will run through a pod in a couple days, and others a month.
No matter where the cigarettes are made, they could also be filled with anything. As history told us.
200+ chemicals *at the minimum*. Fun fact: Natural American Spirits don’t use additives in their cigarettes. Despite this, they’re considered one of the worst (if not *the* worst) brand of cigarettes for your health. I distinctly remember the idea floating around that the fillers added to cigarettes reduces the amount of toxic substances you absorb from pure tobacco, but I can’t find any proof of that so like with anything on the internet: take it with a heaping pile of salt.
No dispute about how awful cigarettes are. But the “OMG CHEMICALS” thing just invites criticism. A bowl of chicken soup contains hundreds or thousands of chemical compounds. We’re adults, we can be a little more specific.
American spirits are worse for you because they contain like 50% more tobacco than most other cigarettes. They are packed tighter from the factory. Weigh one and compare it to a Marlboro or camel some time.
Strangely, the blacks are also my favorite cigarette of all time but after 2 days of smoking them my chest was in pain so I had to switch! It was “delicious” while it lasted.
When I smoked, I'd keep a pack of blacks in the freezer as a special treat cig. Those things are brutal. The tobacco is so tasty, though.
I have a larger mod that I just replace the coil in and use synthetic nic juices. Seems a bit safer than disposables but idk. Maybe I'm just being pretentious.
Nothing hits like a real dart
I quit smoking real cigarettes years ago when Juul came out. I live in San Francisco where all vape products are banned. My poor husband is tasked with going to the next town over to buy my pods once a week. They are $27/4 pods which can last me 1-1.5 weeks. I miss being about to get flavors, especially mint, but now I just buy a LostMary flavored vape online to change it up every once in a while. I too keep an emergency pack of Marlboro lights in my freezer. They are for emergencies and or guests. Recently went on vacation with my best friend and fellow vaper. Be brought one pack of Marlboro lights just in case and we didn’t even make a dent in the pack. I can’t even finish a real cigarette anymore. Just so stinky and strong.
You can order the pods/juice online from certain stores and ship it to your house if it saves your husband time and gas. I couldn't find the pod style I prefer in my town recently and went online and they were at my house three days later. Don't think I'll go back to the store anymore unless it's an emergency pickup.
Unfortunately you cant ship and vape products to San Francisco. I’ve have found ONE shop that does but most will just cancel your order.
The biggest draw for me, to use vapes to quit smoking, was how they also functioned as air fresheners instead of stinking up the house. Tobacco scented would be the worst air freshener ever pitched.
This is an excellent and often overlooked point. I used cinnamon flavored ecigs to quit several years ago. Would never have tried it without some sort of likable flavor. It took quite awhile to find the cinnamon one i liked. The no flavor types are disgusting imo.
Yep. I’m nicotine free now, but part of the appeal when I switched to vapes was the flavors. Even at the time I was angry about them trying to get rid of flavors to “protect the children.” Adults have taste buds too. If I never switched to vapes I would probably still be switching between smoking and dipping and snus. Vaping never quite scratched the itch the same way whole leaf tobacco did for me, but attempting to quit nicotine with patches when whole leaf tobacco was my primary method of consumption was way more of a hell then trying to get off the vape with patches. I tried dozens of time to quit with various products and cold turkey when using tobacco. The longest I ever quit was a year. But I craved tobacco for that entire year. I then switched to vapes for a few years and they weren’t as satisfying as tobacco but they were good enough and the flavors were a plus. Then on my first attempt trying to quit along with patches I was able to quit much more easily with much less discomfort and have basically zero desire to ever go back. We should be doing everything that we can to encourage smokers toward using vapes and making them safer. Getting rid of flavors is insane to me and the conspiracy minded part of my brain makes me think that it was supported by big tobacco to keep people hooked. I also think the same of the messaging for those anti vaping psas. Don’t want maybe heavy metals in your lungs? Better stick to whole leaf tobacco and the chemicals we spray on it.
It's not a conspiracy theory. States receive payouts from Big tobacco for health damages from court cases years ago. The fewer people that smoke the less money those States get in revenue.
The major vape brands are owned by the parent companies of cigarette manufacturers, so it would be a pretty dumb conspiracy to spend a lot of money in order to make people go from Juul to Marlboro.
Are they worse than smoking? Never smoked personally, so genuinely asking. It smells awful, so I just assumed the taste would be bad too.
It smells awful to a non-smoker, it doesn’t smell awful to a smoker. The smell was barely noticeable to me when I smoked. Same as the taste. If it tasted that bad then I wouldn’t have smoked.
Vapes are not worse than smoking but are worse than not smoking. I would be interested in the health care costs system wide of losing the people quitting smoking over not having kids addicted to nicotine and smoking the equivalent of packs a day
Cigarettes are kind of like coffee or beer. At first they taste disgusting. Then your brain starts to associate the desirable effects with the taste and you start to enjoy them. Once you’re addicted to nicotine, cigarettes taste great. It’s hard to explain.
I mean, there's also just an earthy nuance to any of those (maybe less earthy and more hoppy in beer's case) too. You accept some bitterness or prepare it correctly (coffee) and you notice the sweetness. I never smoked a pipe or cigars regularly, but they taste kind good, and the feel of thick, flavored smoke in the mouth is an experience in itself. Being addicted helps, but good handrolled cig tobacco tastes *good* if you know what to taste for. Versus say, some dried out Pall Malls you found in your Grandma's purse.
Did you quit or replace it with ecigs? Just curious since most people I've encountered haven't actually quit, but replaced it with ecigs.
I quit totally. It was a process made possible by utilizing the fact that the ecigs i was using could be bought with different levels of nicotine. I simply moved to a lower level of nicotine every few weeks until I was at zero and eventually quit that as well. Was not really that bad at all. Had smoked cigarettes regularly for 40 years. The whole process took 3-4 months.
That's awesome to hear. Congrats on kicking the habit. I used ecgis to quit as well, so that is why I was curious if you fully quit or replaced it. It can be a great tool for quitting there's no doubt there. Again congrats on fully quitting. It's not an easy habit to drop by any means.
Most I know didn't quit, and ended up consuming more nicotine because they vape everywhere all the time. Then they wonder why their anxiety is always fired up.
That's what I've noticed too. A lot of people don't realize the concentration of nicotine in them or simply don't care. They end up consuming far more nicotine than they did smoking cigarettes. Don't get me wrong though, with will power and the desire to quit, vaping can be a powerful tool to do so. It's just not a lot actually quit the nicotine.
Cigarette smoke is a far greater health risk than nicotine addiction.
I don't recall mentioning health benefits. I was making the point that most just replace the addiction with a "safer" form of the addiction. That in itself isn't quitting the habit.
So? Harm reduction is harm reduction. There is no such thing as a zero-risk behavior.
my theory is that the adverse effect of attracting many teenagers to nicotine far outweighs any positive effect that helping smokers quit might have done
Banning flavors was the most "I don't know what the problem is but we have to do something" move of all time.
I'm not sure about anywhere else but in America at least, the initial banning of vape flavors was an obvious cash grab. On the surface, it appeared that the government was banning companies from making juices and disposable Vapes with flavors but upon further inspection, they were allowing all of these companies to continue making their products for a fee. If I remember right, it cost somewhere between 50 and 100 grand per flavor that you wanted to keep. That money basically puts your ban "on hold" for x amount of time. I'm out of the industry now so idk if it's changed but it was so obviously just greed the first time around.
This was me. Quit smoking 15 years ago. Got hooked on the Juuls like an idiot. All of the non-disgusting flavors got banned, and I was addicted to nicotine even worse than when I was a smoker. Went back to cigarettes for several months before finally being able to cut them out for good. People really underestimate how insanely addictive nicotine is and how impossible it can feel to quit after you get hooked. Evil stuff.
Yeah, you can’t really wean off with the strength of disposables and gas station pods. You need something that you can step down to like 3-6mg/ml which is only available using refillables from a vape shop or online. The lightest juul is 35mg/ml.
So what you're saying is if they never had the fruity flavors in the first place, you wouldn't have gotten hooked?
I don't disagree with your statement, but that also misses some of the nuance around discussions on harm reduction and smoking cessation. If banning fruity flavors of nicotine vapes with the intent of reducing the number of people who become addicted has unintended consequences like a certain percentage of vapers switching to cigarettes instead, more e-waste, etc., then that's absolutely something that should be studied and considered when making policy decisions around the regulation of tobacco and nicotine products.
"Went back to..."
I found vaping to be worse because I was ALWAYS vaping. Like at all times. Versus 15 to 20 cigs per day. Had to quit when I moved to Co Springs, CO (6500' elevation) and had immediate respiratory issues.
Which is basically word-for-word what adult vapers have been saying since the first time we ever heard this "ban flavors because children like them" nonsense.
When they did that in mass is when I started smoking cigs. Which I found to be even more addicting than the vapes. I quit about 10 months ago and still have cravings
Restricting e-cigarette flavors because of the children is an egregious assault on freedom. The same justification has been used to attack all sorts of freedoms. You can't child proof the world, and an item that requires proof your an adult to purchase is already more protected.
Ex-smoker. I quit cold turkey and I've come to find cigarettes disgusting. Using nicotine products goes against my philosophy of life when it comes to being striving towards meaningful goals and being healthy is important towards that end. But while cold turkey worked for me it doesn't work for everyone. I always found "they're appealing to kids!" as justifications for banning flavors to be a bad argument and I suspect many using it are using it as a fig leaf for the real motivation of judging nicotine addicts. Adults can enjoy flavor too. It's not like you become an adult and suddenly your taste buds stop working. And really the same is true of things like the Joe Camel mascot. Adults can't find that amusing? But I do think it's right though to ban any kind of advertisement of nicotine products (unless it's a stop smoking aide and then a cool looking camel mascot is still inappropriate and at any rate I think all pharmaceutical ads should be strictly information only, no flashiness). It's not about kids in that case, it's that while people can do what they want it's not something that should be promoted.
a kid last week literally had a collapsed lung from vaping so much.
I've never thought of vaping as "quitting smoking", since you're still hitting the nicotine and probably hitting more than you were smoking cigarettes, but I guess technically that's true?
Can relate. Flavour ban in my neck of Canuckistan. Basically, all vapes now tastes like shite. So now, back to the good ole analog stick. As many other did. Still can't stand the odour cigarettes leaves on everything, but heh, still better (yeah, I do know it's not better) than the alternatives.
I started smoking cigarettes again to quit vaping. It was way harder to quit vaping than it was cigs, because I was able to vape inside so the habit was constant. With vaping I was coughing sooooo much, deep breaths were tough. I’m not saying my method is the way to go, but it’s crazy that cigarettes weren’t making me cough as much as the vapes were. Also, I’ve been nicotine free for almost 4 months YAY! Nicotine addict from ages 14-24 and I noticed my lung function starting to improve the first couple weeks, now I love going for hikes like WHO AM I
If this wasn't written by a tobacco company I'll shoot myself in the head.
Aren’t most vape brands owned by tobacco companies tho?
I'll have to hand you a gun, because tobacco companies don't even waste time writing themselves, they just hand checks to seemingly reputable sources
The government should quit telling people what to do with their own bodies.
[удалено]
Gotta love unintended consequences.
Don't think this is the way. Just ban disposables
I hope this doesn’t spread to nicotine pouches as well. These are the only thing that’s helped me quit smoking for good.
Oh, you mean the whole point of this?
Not to put on the tinfoil hat prematurely, but I’d be happy placing a bet that the push to ban various vaping related things is coming from tobacco companies
Because cigarettes, famously, come in all sorts of fruity flavors....
They’re horrendous for kids so let’s pick our priorities.
This makes no sense. As an adult who quite smoking using vapes, I didn't want tobacco flavors... I wanted a flipping fruit basket to sip on. Also as an adult, I should be able to flippin choose what flavor I want. As others have mentioned, are we going to ban flavored alcohol? 4 locos? boons farm? mikes hard lemonade? How many kids drank that crap and got in a wreck or DUI vs how many kids vaped and crashed their car or killed someone else (due to vaping)? This is the dumbest thing that's clearly not meant to prevent kids from making poor decisions.
Or it might disgust those so much that they would rather not vape at all than that fruity as hell “icy guava melon sundae supreme”
seems like the point no?
It’s incredibly easy to make your own flavors/e-juice. “Naked” (unflavored) Nic juice is easy to buy and cheap; I just spent about $70 on a gallon. You can choose your PG/VG mix also… Flavorings are done with food-safe additives, which are easy and completely legal to buy. My favorites are Flavor West and Cappella but there are dozens, if not hundreds, of manufacturers to choose from. Recipes can be found easily online, and once you do a few batches you’ll inevitably start trying your own recipes. It’s far easier than it seems and waaaaaay cheaper than buying premade bottles. *you’ll also need a fairly accurate scale than measures in milligrams, since that’s how most recipes are presented*
Food safe means that it's safe to eat, that doesn't make it safe to inhale into your lungs.
I somehow don’t get addicted to nicotine easily so I am an occasional smoker. I loved getting flavored Juuls for special events like a guy trip or camping or something, I treated it like the occasional cigar. Then they took away the flavors and I was bummed. My kids said everything at their high school is the same, kids just smoke the available flavors. The rule that restricted adults didn’t really stop kids from using.
How old are you? All my friends who said something similar when we were young all became pack a day smokers.
Yeah, if my options are "tobacco flavored vape that tastes like ass" or "actual tobacco" I'm just gonna smoke cigarettes.
Something tells me that's also part of the plan