PROFESSOR RICARDO POLOSA
He also reassured MPs that vaping could rarely be seen as a gateway to smoking for people who had never previously smoked and added : “ E-cigarettes with nicotine are spectacular unattractive to non-smokers .
“ The traffic is massively one way [ from smoking to vaping ] and rarely the other .”
Professor Hajek was questioned by the committee on the link between e-cigarettes and cancer .
He told the MPs that studies had shown the cancer risk of e-cigarettes was less than half of the risk associated with traditional cigarettes while Professor Polosa said there was no human data showing any evidence of nicotine alone increasing the risk of cancer .
The professor went on : “ In vitro studies and animal studies have looked at nicotine effects but they don ’ t have clinical significance .
“ Nicotine is not a carcinogenic substance and there is no evidence that nicotine has a carcinogenic effect .”
In written evidence to the Committee , The British Psychological Society said more needed to be done to encourage more smokers to quit .
It said : “ In order for e-cigarettes to be more effective in facilitating transition to non-smoker status e-cigarettes need to address the psychological as well as the biological factors associated with smoking addiction .”
It called for improved education about the relative harms of smoking , nicotine and e-cigarettes and said there should be public messaging campaigns to disseminate correct evidencebased information about the harms of smoking / reduced health risk of e-cigarettes and the potential benefit of e-cigarettes for smoking cessation .
The Society also called for increased taxes on cigarettes combined with lighter regulation for reduced risk products , adding : “ For e-cigarettes , avoid taxation and ‘ vape-free ’ legislation and promote unrestricted advertising of factual information .”
It said there should also be more research to explore the effects of e-cigarettes on smoking cessation to determine which devices offer the best potential for quitting , for whom and under what circumstances .
The Science and Technology Committee is examining the impact of electronic cigarettes on human health ( including their effectiveness as a stop-smoking tool ), the suitability of regulations guiding their use , and the financial implications of a growing market on both business and the NHS .
THE full , two-hour hearing is viewable at parliament . tv
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