Aidan Semmens, Author at ECigIntelligence

A blogger’s farewell – who knows all the known unknowns on e-cigs and health?

Written by Aidan Semmens || 10th August 2023 || Blogs |

It was cannabis joints that lured me into smoking. Once tipped out into the world of work, the cannabis was easy enough to give up. The tobacco not so much. Ultimately, it’s all about the nicotine ...

Sustainability versus waste and pollution – it’s the major, growing issue we all face

Written by Aidan Semmens || 3rd August 2023 || Blogs |

While no industry, from aviation to mining, farming to fishing, can pretend to be uninvolved in the major growing issue of the environment, the e-cigarette industry is just as inescapably bound up in the debate ...

Disposable truth – throwaway vapes are bad for everyone’s environmental health

Written by Aidan Semmens || 19th July 2023 || Blogs |

There are growing calls on both sides of the Atlantic for disposable e-cigarettes to be banned, partly on “save the children” grounds, but mostly and more plausibly on account of environmental concerns ...

Talking rot – attention-seeking headings that fail to meet any standards of reality

Written by Aidan Semmens || 6th July 2023 || Blogs |

“Disposable vapes that do not meet UK standards should be banned”...“Urgent vape warning as deadly ‘flesh-rotting’ drug discovered in e-cigarettes” – what on Earth is going on here? ...

When it comes to the argument over vaping, who are the real men in black?

Written by Aidan Semmens || 22nd June 2023 || Blogs |

A number of social media campaigns are dedicated to rubbishing the World Health Organization over its opposition to vaping. But who are the real “men in dark suits”? ...

The epidemic’s metaphorical, but the problem of cute disposables is all too real

Written by Aidan Semmens || 8th June 2023 || Blogs |

“There is absolutely no reason that these cheap, readily available, brightly coloured, recreational products should be single use,” said Mike Kean, vice president of the UK’s Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health ...

School for scandal – how metal detectors highlighted a troubling youth trend

Written by Aidan Semmens || 29th May 2023 || Blogs |

The first item on the BBC’s morning news round-up was about vaping – and of course, as you expect even in e-cig-loving Britain, the news wasn’t good ...

New vapes for old – a possible, partial solution to a disposable problem?

Written by Aidan Semmens || 18th May 2023 || Blogs |

For a still relatively young industry, the e-cigarette business isn’t what it was – not that it’s withering away, but it’s definitely changing, and not in ways everyone in it would want ...

Food or vape? The battle of Hämeenlinna puts the question of flavours on the table

Written by Aidan Semmens || 11th May 2023 || Blogs |

Would you flavour your food – your fairy-cake, say, or your soup – with drops of something called Ultimate Ragnarok out of a little bottle bearing a picture of a horned god wielding a battleaxe? ...

Australian government ready to get tougher still on tobacco e-cigarettes

Written by Aidan Semmens || 4th May 2023 || Blogs |

Health minister Mark Butler wasn’t mincing his words. “Australia needs to reclaim its position as a world leader on tobacco control,” he said as he announced a plan to toughen up... on e-cigarettes ...

Not flag-waving but drowning – has UK been hit by a ‘tidal wave’ of dodgy vapes?

Written by Aidan Semmens || 20th April 2023 || Blogs |

Trading Standards officers across vape-friendly Britain complain they are being “overwhelmed by the volume of non-compliant vapes being sold by retailers” ...

Minnesota settlement follows closely on Juul’s $462m deal with six other states

Written by Aidan Semmens || 18th April 2023 || News analysis |

Juul Labs and its former investor Altria have reached a settlement with the US state of Minnesota over Juul’s alleged deceptive marketing of e-cigarettes and supposed role in encouraging youth vaping ...

How the same figures can be made to tell a bad news or good news story on vaping

Written by Aidan Semmens || 6th April 2023 || Blogs |

While statistics are vital to understanding our world, they are often misunderstood – and that can be important when it comes to forming opinions and laws on controversial issues such as e-cigarettes ...

Our disposable environment – from one discarded vape to a world of regulation

Written by Aidan Semmens || 22nd March 2023 || Blogs |

While not specifically related to e-cigarettes or tobacco products, moves in both the EU and the US towards environmental regulations are likely to have a major impact on those sectors. And this is why ...

Altruistic Altria, or why an anti-tobacco activist has taken up the giants’ cause

Written by Aidan Semmens || 1st March 2023 || Blogs |

Is Dave Dobbins’s switch from COO of the Truth Initiative to a role with a tobacco company a case of gamekeeper turned poacher – or is there another interpretation we can put on it? ...

Waste not, want not – battle lines are drawn over the field of disposable vapes

Written by Aidan Semmens || 9th February 2023 || Blogs |

While e-cigs may or may not be on balance a good thing for humans, it’s hard to see the boom in disposables as anything other than a sore point for the planet ...

As cigarette smoking declines, cannabis rises – but where does vaping fit in?

Written by Aidan Semmens || 5th January 2023 || Blogs |

Recent figures show young US adults are smoking less tobacco and using more cannabis – but is this cause-and-effect, and if so, where does vaping fit into the picture? ...

The family doctor who gives cigarettes to his 14-year-old son to stop him vaping

Written by Aidan Semmens || 6th December 2022 || Blogs |

Should e-cigarettes be prescribed to help smokers quit? One Australian family doctor has bizarrely turned the question on its head, asking: Should cigarettes be prescribed to help vapers quit? ...

Vaping ‘within five minutes of waking’ – the truth behind the click-bait headlines

Written by Aidan Semmens || 23rd November 2022 || Blogs |

The magazine headline said: “More Teens Are Vaping Within 5 Minutes of Waking”. So where does that attention-grabbing line come from, what does it really reveal – and whose line is it anyway? ...

PMI ‘sinners’ talk a greener talk than some at climate summit will walk

Written by Aidan Semmens || 9th November 2022 || Blogs |

In a recent interview, Jennifer Motles urged companies of all kinds to use ESG (environmental, social and governance) impact reporting as a tool to transform business models which have negative impacts ...

Why ‘wellness’ vapes just might be less healthy than the wicked nicotine kind

Written by Aidan Semmens || 6th October 2022 || Blogs |

In demonising nicotine, have many of vaping’s bitterest opponents across the globe got their sights trained on the wrong enemy? ...

The disposable truth: what you see on the label may not always be what you get

Written by Aidan Semmens || 21st September 2022 || Blogs |

Scientists studying nicotine levels in disposable e-cigs found claims weren't always backed up by facts. In fact, if their sample is truly representative and their methods accurate, vapers may be getting sold short ...

New Zealand anti-smoking group offers a less strident approach to vape flavours

Written by Aidan Semmens || 15th September 2022 || Blogs |

It’s refreshing to encounter a campaigning health charity making a clear argument that retailers should be permitted to sell e-liquids in fruit and other sweet flavours, and not be limited to tobacco, mint and menthol ...

The life of a harm reduction advocate in a land where e-cigarettes are banned

Written by Aidan Semmens || 18th August 2022 || Blogs |

It can be hard to be in a minority, with no apparent way of persuading others to your point of view – such as being a harm reduction advocate in a country where e-cigarettes are illegal ...

The demise of the cigarette – the good bad news they don’t want you to hear

Written by Aidan Semmens || 4th August 2022 || Blogs |

This week’s financial report from Japan Tobacco International tells a tale that should make bedroom and boardroom reading for government officials, public health departments and regulators everywhere ...

The news on e-cigarette research may seem relentlessly bad – but do you buy it?

Written by Aidan Semmens || 21st July 2022 || Blogs |

Bad news is like sex – it sells. And not every scientist is as rigorous as they might be – those who write their press releases even less so. Which leaves the question of who to believe ...

Mere possession of an e-cig ‘won’t mean jail’ – but retailers had better watch out

Written by Aidan Semmens || 13th July 2022 || Blogs |

Trust a politician to come up with a memorable soundbite, a catchy slogan or a simple statement that leaps out at you from the headlines. Top prize this week to Malaysia’s health minister Khairy Jamaluddin ...

An innovative and unexpected scheme to put ‘disposable’ e-cig batteries to new use

Written by Aidan Semmens || 9th July 2022 || Blogs |

One of the major points in favour of lithium batteries is rechargeability – which ought to be a good thing from the green perspective – but that benefit is literally thrown away in the case of disposable e-cigs...

Which side is the e-cig science really on – does it support your tribe or mine?

Written by Aidan Semmens || 24th June 2022 || Blogs |

As far as we can tell, God has no opinion on the subject of vaping. Science, almost equally unhelpfully, has plenty of opinions – and they don’t all agree ...

Blue sky thinking brings a breath of fresh air to the question of quitting vaping

Written by Aidan Semmens || 5th May 2022 || Blogs |

E-cigs are meant to be an aid to quitting smoking: now, perhaps inevitably, comes a device that promises to help people quit vaping. But is it all it's cracked up to be? ...

Flair 1, Rigour 0 – how The Conversation turned against the benefits of vaping

Written by Aidan Semmens || 18th April 2022 || Blogs |

An article in an international news magazine describes what it calls "A damning review of e-cigarettes" – a description that doesn't do justice to a major piece of academic work that is much more balanced than that suggests...

Anti-vape lawmakers find themselves caught in a web of their own devising

Written by Aidan Semmens || 6th April 2022 || Blogs |

A no-doubt well-meaning ballot measure enthusiastically taken up by voters just 18 months ago now has General Assembly members in the US state of Colorado tied up in a knot of their own making ...

Trouble in paradise: accusations fly in Hawaiian battle over flavour ban plan

Written by Aidan Semmens || 28th March 2022 || Blogs |

There’s some dissension in the state of Hawaii, with some fairly heavy accusations flying around in the public debate over a proposed bill to ban e-cigarette flavours ...

The science and non-science of vaping – and a heart-stopper just for the boys

Written by Aidan Semmens || 2nd March 2022 || Blogs |

We hear a lot these days, especially from politicians, about “following the science” – which must be a lot better, surely, than merely following the politicians. But it’s not unproblematic ...

Do sin taxes work – or do they just encourage people to be more sinful?

Written by Aidan Semmens || 17th February 2022 || Blogs |

Whatever the motives behind it, punitive or would-be persuasive taxation has many of the same drawbacks as prohibition ...

Only in California: the all-pure cannabis vape pod from the inventors of Juul

Written by Aidan Semmens || 9th February 2022 || Blogs |

The latest offering from the company that first devised the Juul e-cigarette looks sure to be a new Californian craze – even if it's not exactly “made solely from pure cannabis” ...

Tie me up, tie me down! Why a bit of red tape can be good for the vape business

Written by Aidan Semmens || 2nd February 2022 || Blogs |

Freedom from regulation isn’t necessarily a desirable thing – as one vape store owner in Trinidad will tell you ...

How will the Covid-19 pandemic change the e-cigarette business in the long term?

Written by Aidan Semmens || 19th January 2022 || Blogs |

ECigIntelligence will be drawing together much of the evidence for an in-depth examination of how Covid has affected and will continue to affect the vapour business. Meanwhile, certain trends are clear ...

Officials on both sides of the Atlantic caught in an old nicotine delusion

Written by Aidan Semmens || 13th January 2022 || Blogs |

Is nicotine really the big baddie when it comes to tobacco products and their alternatives? Some people in positions of authority – people you might think ought to know better – still seem to think so ...

How smokers with no plans to quit may hold the key to e-cigs’ future regulation

Written by Aidan Semmens || 5th January 2022 || Blogs |

An original and potentially highly significant piece of peer-reviewed research published last week could – and should – have an impact on the way e-cigarettes are regarded and regulated in the US ...

A dying habit? New Zealand backs vaping in bold plan to kill off smoking for good

Written by Aidan Semmens || 22nd December 2021 || Blogs |

New Zealand has designated a cohort of young people – those who will be 14 or younger when the government’s proposed law comes into effect – who will never be old enough to smoke ...

Is it the end for F1’s long tobacco tie-up – or does McLaren’s Vuse promo count?

Written by Aidan Semmens || 15th December 2021 || Blogs |

It’s the end of an era as tobacco sponsorship of Formula One racing comes to an end – again. Or does it and is it? ...

Could cocaine vapes be a smart new way to crack an old addiction problem?

Written by Aidan Semmens || 8th December 2021 || Blogs |

It may have originated as an alternative means of administering nicotine, avoiding the dangers of smoking, but vaping technology has many other potential uses – most notably for the delivery of other kinds of drug ...

Will Califf and the Biden administration really heed the science on e-cigarettes?

Written by Aidan Semmens || 18th November 2021 || Blogs |

Robert Califf, US president Joe Biden’s choice to take up leadership of the FDA again, has unfinished business with the agency – and with e-cigarettes in particular ...

While WHO won’t even talk about them, UK prepares for e-cigs on prescription

Written by Aidan Semmens || 4th November 2021 || Blogs |

The timing, one clear week before the opening of COP9, the latest (virtual) gathering of the parties to the World Health Organization’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (WHO FCTC), was interesting ...

A regulatory gulf is set to open between neighbours Shenzhen and Hong Kong

Written by Aidan Semmens || 28th October 2021 || Blogs |

It’s about 19 miles from downtown Shenzhen to the centre of Hong Kong as the crow flies, but in e-cigarette terms the distance between them is huge and about to get bigger ...

An ‘epidemic’ of double-think among the anti-vaping brigade – and not just in US

Written by Aidan Semmens || 21st October 2021 || Blogs |

Public handwringing about the alleged “epidemic” of youth vaping has become tantamount to an epidemic itself – and and here’s a striking example from Bangladesh ...

FDA’s views on Vuse have potential to change the whole vaping landscape

Written by Aidan Semmens || 14th October 2021 || Blogs |

The granting of RJ Reynolds’s PMTAs for its Vuse Solo e-cigarette device and two of its pods is very big news for the US vaping industry, its supporters, its customers, and its opponents ...

Reporting disorder: don’t let the facts get in the way of a good bad-news story

Written by Aidan Semmens || 22nd September 2021 || Blogs |

Politicians and all those who lay down the law have become very fond of talking about “following the science”. Which sounds like a good idea, right? Well, yes, as long as it’s good science and not a bad...

‘Significant progress’ – but the US FDA’s biggest decisions are still to come

Written by Aidan Semmens || 15th September 2021 || Blogs , News analysis |

The dog didn’t eat all the FDA’s homework – just 7% of it. But there will be those who argue that the missing 7% was the crucial bit all along ...

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