On 18 Oct. 2017 the Sun papers carried an op-ed by me in which I take to task governments in Canada for failing to understand how technological change is transforming the tobacco landscape and opening possibilities of harm reduction that a fixation on abstinence causes us to miss. As I wrote at the time:
“The distinction between combustion (“smoking”) and tobacco use is not a trivial one. Many people derive comfort and pleasure from a hit of nicotine – one no riskier to your health than other completely legal stimulants like coffee, alcohol and (soon) marijuana. You’d think, therefore, that technological advances that allowed people to indulge their nicotine habit while largely eliminating the health risks associated with tobacco combustion would be welcomed by the same people for whom “harm-reduction” is a byword when dealing with various other vices. The reverse is the case.”
