As with any tobacco control milestone, you’ll hear all kinds of shenanigans bullshit from the usual suspects. But before we get into that, let’s rewind a bit. 10 years in fact.

At the tender and innocent age of 27 (snark), at (oddly enough) this exact time of year I was on the usual lads holiday. A week of sun, sand and lots and lots of beer. Well, it’d be rude not to.

Unsurprisingly, there’s another ‘campaign’ about second hand smoking.

Campaign launched about dangers of children’s exposure to second-hand smoke

I thought that this particular part of the anti-smoker arsenal had long since been over utilised, it turns out I was mistaken.

Y’see, in April this year one particular anti-smoking group kicked the bucket. It became an ex-anti-smoking group. Most folk I know celebrated the demise of Healthier Futures, which followed on from the demise of Smokefree South West - both groups tried a last ditch re-brand in order to stay current with “public health epidemics” - with Fresh NE taking ownership of the Healthier Futures IP.

Here we go again. Yet another “study” that “suggests that among non-daily smokers, young adults who use e-cigarettes tend to smoke more cigarettes and to do so more frequently. Such individuals may be at greater risk for chronic tobacco use and dependence.”

Amusingly, this study was ‘accepted’ by the journal Preventative Medicine in March this year - which would have been around the time that the latest figures from the CDC was being compiled - that data was published in June.

Today saw the release of the latest set of data for smoking prevalence within the UK from the Office of National Statistics Annual Population Survey and the Opinions and Lifestyle Survey.

As you would expect from the UK, with its generally liberal stance on e-cigarettes, and despite the shitstorm of piss poor media reporting on various studies, stupid legislation proposals, daft bans, and general bullshit; e-cigarettes remain the most common aid for people to move away from tobacco.

Once again researchers are scraping the bottom of the barrel in an effort to “prove” that vaping is bad for you. Most readers will remember the worst vaping article of 2016 in The Sun - though there was an altogether bizarre story drawn from an anecdotal story on Reddit which may pip that by a nose. This time around, vaping is apparently no better - or specifically, found to be just as bad as (wait for it) - unfiltered tobacco cigarettes.

As with most debates from tobacco control, regarding plain packaging there remained one, quite crucial, point that was conspicuous by its absence. No one could categorically say that plain packaging would work. Not one person could stand up and claim that drab, olive-green packs with larger warnings would amount to much of a decrease in smoking prevalence. Well, except Debs, but then she’s always had her head in the clouds (it’ll be responsible for 300,000 smokers giving up the ‘deadly weed’ of course. Bravo Bollocks).

Well. This is it. Today is the last day of the transition period. Tomorrow, May 20th, is the day when any non-notified vaping product can no longer be legally sold. Tomorrow is when the new legislation will really start to bite.

What will happen? There isn’t a straightforward answer to that.

Let’s look at what we, as a community of consumers have been able to enjoy.

Over the years, we have been able to enjoy tank sizes of up to a whopping 7-8ml. I once complained about the drive towards a particular subset. Was I right to do so? Maybe, maybe not. Let’s face it, the number of tanks on the market that are in excess of the ridiculous 2ml limit imposed aren’t generally going to be for new users, and rarely for the average Joe in the street that just wants an alternative to smoking.

Well this is a rather lovely to-do isn’t it?

The smoking ban. Introduced on July 1st 2007 (in England, but the Scots had to go one better and implement it officially on March 26th 2006. Plus Wales did it on April 2nd 2007 – if only it had been a day earlier – and Northern Ireland on April 20th 2007). The ban is now almost 10 years old.

For those that don’t remember how it all came about, a brief history lesson is needed.

I know, it’s been awhile since I last put finger to key. Far too much going on outside the twitter- & blog-spheres for me to put aside time to regularly post. Real life eh?

It seems the hypocritical vapers friend ASH have been up to their old tricks. Again. I’m not at all surprised, after all this time last year they said the 250,000 vapers that use 20mg/ml and above don’t matter. Fancy that!

Undercover investigation finds 9 in 10 vape shops prepared to sell to non-smokers

This is news according to the Royal Society of Public Health. According to the quotes in the media, there is an industry wide ‘Code of Conduct’ that, apparently, all vape shops supposedly abide by. Thing is, that really isn’t the case.

There are two main trade organisations responsible for the vaping industry in the UK - ECITA and IBVTA - that govern the non-regulatory rules, a “best practice” if you will. In this instance, the RSPH have picked up on a point in the IBVTA code of conduct: