Say that public health in India is at greater risk under a prohibitive environment than by allowing smokers use an alternative option based on nicotine replacement via e-cigarettes/ENDS
In an appeal to JP Nadda, Minister of Health and Family Welfare, Government of India, Dr M Siddiqi, Chairman, Cancer Foundation of India, Kolkata and Prof RN Sharan, Professor of Biochemistry, North-Eastern Hill University, Shillong, have stated that while tobacco-associated cancer is easily preventable by cessation of tobacco usage, the primary cause of cancer is not nicotine – the additive component of tobacco and the cause of craving – but the constituents of the ‘smoke’ in combustible tobacco, and ‘other’ constituents in chewing tobacco. The experts have urged the Union Minister of Health and Family Welfare that banning of e-cigarettes/ENDS could be disastrous for India which houses the second largest smoking population in the world (not including the bidi/ hukkah/ chilam smoking or tobacco/ areca nut chewing populations).
Both Dr Siddiqi and Prof Sharan, in a joint letter to the Union Health Minister, have appealed that modern technology which delivers safe nicotine in an acceptable form should be looked at as an alternative nicotine replacement option. This includes electronic nicotine delivery systems (ENDS), popularly known as e-cigarettes, banning which, therefore, should not be thought of.
They say that public health in India is at greater risk under a prohibitive environment than by allowing smokers, who wish to cease tobacco use, an alternative option based on nicotine replacement via e-cigarettes/ electronic nicotine delivery devices (ENDS), urge experts