![]() Yet it was obvious even then that the true causes of the outbreak lay elsewhere. Anti-smoking groups latched onto the story, eager to prove at last that vapers who believed they'd found a safer way of consuming nicotine were deluding themselves. Even the acronym the CDC gave to the disease-EVALI, short for "E-Cigarette or Vaping product use Associated Lung Injury"-prematurely implicated e-cigs. Although it's clear now that contaminants in black market cannabis cartridges were the primary culprit, officials at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) were determined to blame nicotine e-cigarettes. The fear that vapers are poisoning themselves en masse got a boost from a mysterious lung illness that emerged in summer 2019. There are a few genuine reasons for concern, but the kids are largely all right. And despite the endless press coverage of an adolescent Juul craze, sober analyses of the data generally conclude that most youth vaping is experimental, that habitual use among young people who have not tried tobacco is rare, and that rates of teen smoking are at their lowest levels in recorded history. ![]() As anyone who has known or been a teenager might attest, these are not exactly discriminating diagnostic criteria. ![]() He advises them to "know the signs" that their child may be a vape addict-signs including acne, secretiveness, irritability, and frequent snacking. Worried parents are clearly a target audience for Lamm's book, and he does nothing to assuage their fears. ![]() The moral panic over vaping is driven by two primary narratives: that e-cigarette use is an epidemic among teenagers and that the practice has deadly consequences. In that sense, it provides a useful look at how coverage of the topic has become increasingly fear-based. This section is a greatest hits collection of anti-vaping stories, recounting every possible danger and dismissing every possible benefit. Adequately critiquing Lamm's selective reading of the scientific literature would be like trying to perform a live fact-check of a Trump campaign rally the torrent of error is too much for any one person to handle. By page 30, such a thicket had accumulated that I gave up. Initially I attempted to keep track of misleading statements and critical omissions by marking them with Post-its. The opening section, "Lies and Facts," offers a preponderance of the former. One shouldn't judge a book by its cover, but in this case the text lives up to expectations. No one "smokes" an e-cigarette-the absence of smoke is the whole point of the device-and this obvious misunderstanding foreshadows worse to come. Then there's the subtitle: Your Four-Step, 28-Day Program To Stop Smoking E-Cigarettes. Oz, a TV host notorious for promoting purportedly miraculous dietary supplements. There's the line boasting a foreword by Mehmet Oz, better known as Dr. Just looking at the front cover, you can see signs that Lamm's approach may be less than scientifically rigorous. The latest example is Quit Vaping, a new book by the Los Angeles–based "certified intervention specialist" Brad Lamm. No matter how thoroughly they've been debunked, scare stories about the widespread lethality of e-cigarettes keep seizing the imaginations of journalists, politicians, and concerned parents. They say a lie will go 'round the world while truth is pulling its boots on, but today's debates over vaping may make you wonder if truth should even bother tying its laces. Quit Vaping: Your Four-Step, 28-Day Program To Stop Smoking E-Cigarettes, by Brad Lamm, Penguin, 256 pages, $16
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