FEATURE
Understanding heat-not-burn products
and what they mean to vapers.
When it comes to the debate about vaping and smoking then most
vapers would agree that, in the most simplistic terms, vaping is
good and smoking is bad.
The global vape industry is full of stories of how e-cigarettes
changed the lives of former smokers for the better and we have
reported such stories from our very first edition, and ever since.
In this narrative tobacco companies, and Big Tobacco in particular, is
seen as bad or some may go as far as to say the enemy.
However with Big Tobacco investing heavily in both vape products
and other alternative smoking products the lines are now somewhat
blurred to say the least. For example in September Philip
Morris International (PMI) launched the Foundation for a Smoke-
Free World. Foundation head and former senior World Health
Organisation (WHO) figure, Derek Yach, said: “I have been working
with PMI to establish a foundation to accelerate the end of smoking
and tackle the consequences for tobacco farmers.”
In fact the home page of the PMI website, contains the manifesto
headline “Designing a Smoke-Free Future” and asks: “How long will
PMI be in the cigarette business?”
The website says: “We’ve built the world’s most successful cigarette
company, with the world’s most popular and iconic brands.
“Now we’ve made a dramatic decision. We’re building PMI’s
future on smoke-free products that are a much better choice than
cigarette smoking.
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“Indeed, our vision – for all of us at PMI – is that these products will
one day replace cigarettes.”
And at the beginning of the year, as reported in our news section,
Philip Morris announced its New Year’s Resolution to quit selling
cigarettes in the UK.
It wants smokers to switch to “less harmful, yet satisfying,
alternatives to smoking” and has invested more than £2.5bn in
researching and development alternative products such as those
commonly referred to as heat-not-burn products.
But what is heat-not-burn and is it a threat to the vaping industry?
Heat-not-burn products, also referred to as heated tobacco
products, contain tobacco, which is heated and turned into a nicotine-
containing aerosol that has much lower amounts of harmful
chemicals than in cigarette smoke.
As nothing is burned there is no ash, no smoke and considerably less
smell than you would get from a traditional cigarette.
At the moment the Philip Morris IQOS product is the only heat-not-burn
product on the UK market but other tobacco companies are working to
launch their own rival products. IQOS devices are already being sold
in UK vape shops and the numbers of stockists are increasing month
on month. Both heated tobacco and e-cigarettes are less harmful to
health than smoking and while many smokers successfully transition
to vaping products (just look at how huge the global vaping industry
is now) there are also many who do not.