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No, I'm not saying that. I'm saying that even if 10k people in the US avoided 1million in catastrophic care due to tobacco (and believe me, there are many more

No, I'm not saying that. I'm saying that even if 10k people in the US avoided 1million in catastrophic care due to tobacco (and believe me, there are many more than 10k cases per year - some cancer treatments cost $200k+ just in pharmaceuticals), that's $10bn in savings. Considering how most vape products seem to be made on a shoestring in some factory in China, I think CDC and the FDA should be throwing enormous amounts of money into building high quality, super effective vape products.

bagacrap 7y ago
Have you heard of a juul?
big_chungus 7y ago
What you're not considering is the demand induced by a "safer" product. Look at the recent vaping epidemic among teen-age youth. How do you know continuing to improve vape technology won't continue to drive up demand to the point where the cost burden is spread more thinly across more people? E.g. instead of fewer people having very expensive cancer care, vaping could still cause some damage and incur costs across more people.
- allovernow 7y ago
  This is bullshit think of the children scaremongering. Even among teens smoking rates are dropping. Adults are responsible enough to make the choice for health reasons. And there's still zero indication that vaping is harmful, so at the very least it's not as bad as smoking since it's been around for a decade at least now and nothing obvious has come up. And nicotine has this weird reputation as being dangerous, but beyond addictiveness it has not be shown to be harmful, even potentially neuroprotective. Not to mention scaremongers tend to ignore that it is a stimulant, and can help with anxiety. Schizos are known to self medicate with it, for example. >https://time.com/5727662/smoking-vaping-rates-2018/ https://time.com/5727662/smoking-vaping-rates-2018/
  - MiroF 7y ago
    Nicotine use and addiction among teens is higher than it has been in decades. The rates are staggering. Agreed that is a completely different problem than smoking, but still worth discussing since it is so addictive.
    - s1artibartfast 7y ago
      I would love to see the numbers on that. What i often seen is the number of teens who have vaped in the last year compared to habitual smokers
    - allovernow 7y ago
      I don't entirely disagree. There may be negative changes in brain structure associated with early onset use - though there may also be positive changes that will go unnoticed because of stigma.
  - pdonis 7y ago
    > there's still zero indication that vaping is harmful, so at the very least it's not as bad as smoking since it's been around for a decade at least now and nothing obvious has come up Do you know how long smoking was around before we had actual evidence that it was harmful? (Hint: The rough order of magnitude of the time is centuries.)
    - schrodinger 7y ago
      To be fair we’re much better at evaluating these things now.
    - allovernow 7y ago
      Modern medical care has advanced exponentially in the last 100 years. There weren't regular, organized, multithousand data point case studies back then.
      - pdonis 7y ago
        > There weren't regular, organized, multithousand data point case studies back then. Case studies can't spot harm faster than the harm occurs. The main harm from smoking is a significantly increased risk of lung cancer and other illnesses which can take decades to show up. That's why even with modern medicine advancing over the last century it took so long to nail down the health risks of smoking.

bagacrap 7y ago

Have you heard of a juul?

big_chungus 7y ago

What you're not considering is the demand induced by a "safer" product. Look at the recent vaping epidemic among teen-age youth. How do you know continuing to improve vape technology won't continue to drive up demand to the point where the cost burden is spread more thinly across more people? E.g. instead of fewer people having very expensive cancer care, vaping could still cause some damage and incur costs across more people.

allovernow 7y ago
This is bullshit think of the children scaremongering. Even among teens smoking rates are dropping. Adults are responsible enough to make the choice for health reasons. And there's still zero indication that vaping is harmful, so at the very least it's not as bad as smoking since it's been around for a decade at least now and nothing obvious has come up. And nicotine has this weird reputation as being dangerous, but beyond addictiveness it has not be shown to be harmful, even potentially neuroprotective. Not to mention scaremongers tend to ignore that it is a stimulant, and can help with anxiety. Schizos are known to self medicate with it, for example. >https://time.com/5727662/smoking-vaping-rates-2018/ https://time.com/5727662/smoking-vaping-rates-2018/
- MiroF 7y ago
  Nicotine use and addiction among teens is higher than it has been in decades. The rates are staggering. Agreed that is a completely different problem than smoking, but still worth discussing since it is so addictive.
  - s1artibartfast 7y ago
    I would love to see the numbers on that. What i often seen is the number of teens who have vaped in the last year compared to habitual smokers
  - allovernow 7y ago
    I don't entirely disagree. There may be negative changes in brain structure associated with early onset use - though there may also be positive changes that will go unnoticed because of stigma.
- pdonis 7y ago
  > there's still zero indication that vaping is harmful, so at the very least it's not as bad as smoking since it's been around for a decade at least now and nothing obvious has come up Do you know how long smoking was around before we had actual evidence that it was harmful? (Hint: The rough order of magnitude of the time is centuries.)
  - schrodinger 7y ago
    To be fair we’re much better at evaluating these things now.
  - allovernow 7y ago
    Modern medical care has advanced exponentially in the last 100 years. There weren't regular, organized, multithousand data point case studies back then.
    - pdonis 7y ago
      > There weren't regular, organized, multithousand data point case studies back then. Case studies can't spot harm faster than the harm occurs. The main harm from smoking is a significantly increased risk of lung cancer and other illnesses which can take decades to show up. That's why even with modern medicine advancing over the last century it took so long to nail down the health risks of smoking.