Los Angeles Bans Vaping/Ecigs in ALL public spaces

[JackInGreen]

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-los-angeles-ecigarettes-ban-20140304,0,4359853.story#axzz2v8zVCB9i

I'm not sure what to make of this...my wife and I smoked for a very long time, we quit for 5 years, and then started again. We have recently switched to ecigs/'The Electric Hookah' as they seem to be branded in Washington State. I use a 0% nicotine fluid, my wife uses a 6mg nicotine fluid, but it would appear that both of us would be banned from vaping in public.
We've considered this a great success in 'quitting' and supplementing the aspects we like about smoking with something that, here to fore in research, has shown to have few to none of the health draw backs.
I might get flamed for this, but do we have any research available to us here or could I ask the group(s) to comment and provide any data in support/against this move? I thought we were doing a good thing (and our son is certainly happier).

[PennyK]

1. I suggest you start here

http://www.e-cigarette-forum.com/forum/ is a very big forum. You'll see the link to CASAA, the group dedicated to providing legislative and health information. And join up! We talk about everything under the sun, just like DU.

[Alan Selk]

2. How did Democrats become Puritans?

I have to ask why the three largest cities in the US, LA. Chicago, and NYC have all banned electronic cigarettes in all places where cigarettes are banned, despite the fact that second hand vapor has essentially no negative health effects.

So what happened to these big city democratic politicians. As a solid democrat I am finding it insane that they are working against something that is clearly helping people and improving public health. The politicians appear to have become so fanatically in their approach to tobacco they have gone off the deep end.

[PennyK]

3. Completely agree

It's taking the Bloomberg approach rather than the Puritan approach, I think. It looks like smoking, so it must "be" equivalent? I seriously don't understand it at all. Maybe we need Whole Foods to start selling Organic e-juice (which does exist and I have some).

[aikanae]

4. Join CAASA

I can't defend Dem's position on vaping. All the evidence points to ecigs being the most positive improvement in public health since I can remember (that's over half a century). It can probably save more lives than the ACA and look, smoking cessation / vaping topics are regulated to a small "back page" forum!

There are quite a few advocacy groups going in California to stop vaping bans. One is the IMPROOF movement. As the previous poster mentioned, check out ECF for details.

Personally, I have little doubt that ALEC is behind many of these bans. They are cookie cutter legislation, top down and not happening at the request of the population. Put it this way, 85% of the price of a pack of cigarettes is taxes. That's a significant percentage of the operating budget in many states, often fundng health programs like Kids Care. Great - so if a person quits smoking they can feel guilty about some kid not getting healthcare.

Tying cigarette taxes to public programs is a really bad idea if they truly want people to change their habits. Smoking has decreased for the first time in 30 years. Now they panic. It's contradictory. Dem's are on the wrong side of this issue and it'll hurt them in the polls - not so much there's anyone else to vote for, but in lack of turnout. They need to at least pretend to look at the evidence rather than large corporate biased studies.