VApril
A nationwide awareness and education campaign is being rolled out by the vaping sector across the UK next month
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by Dave Cross
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The initiative comes on the back of Public Health England’s (PHE) recent review into vaping which reinforced that it was 95% less harmful than smoking and revealed that it was one of the most successful ways to quit conventional cigarettes.
The campaign will call upon the country’s smokers to Take the VApril Challenge, which will involve vaping master classes at specialist retail stores for smokers to learn about the different products and nicotine strengths that are best suited to a successful quit. As part of the initiative, the UKVIA has published a special education guide – Vaping to break the Smoking Habit.
http://www.vapril.org/
Doctor Christian said: “I am always amazed and disappointed to hear that we still have 7m smokers in this country and, according to PHE, around 40% of them have never tried vaping. Furthermore, more than half of the population don’t realise that vaping is a fraction of the risk of smoking.”
“That’s why I’m a committed supporter of the idea of a national vaping awareness campaign such as VApril to encourage smokers to take the first steps to quitting their habit. Already some 1.5m vapers have given up smoking altogether, but more education is needed to ensure this figure keeps growing.”
John Dunne, a director of the UKVIA, added: “This will be the largest campaign ever run by the vaping industry and reflects how far the sector has come in a relatively short period of time. The challenge for the industry, government and the public health community is to get across the message that e-cigarettes are a very small risk compared to smoking and that nearly 3m smokers are now vaping, with a significant number having switched over altogether. VApril aims to be the starting point for more smokers to quit their habit.”
Doctor Christian has a message for current smokers: “According to a recent report by Public Health England (PHE), e-cigarettes may be contributing to at least 20,000 successful new quits per year – with the industry estimating this figure to be much higher. And there are already some 1.5m vapers in the UK who have quit smoking altogether.”
“I’m delighted to be joining forces with the UKVIA to launch VApril, the UK’s first ever vaping education and awareness campaign. I personally believe vaping has overwhelming potential to help smokers break their habit, and this is important because stopping smoking is the single most significant step that people can make to improve their health. Vaping is backed by PHE who say electronic cigarettes are 95% safer than smoking.”
Smokers wanting to switch to vaping need to sign up for a free ticket at their nearest venue. Events will be taking place at vape stores in Belfast, Birmingham, Bristol, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Leeds, Leicester, Liverpool, London & the South East and Newcastle.
The website has answers to some common concerns held by smokers.
Photo Credit:
Dave Cross
Journalist at POTVDave is a freelance writer; with articles on music, motorbikes, football, pop-science, vaping and tobacco harm reduction in Sounds, Melody Maker, UBG, AWoL, Bike, When Saturday Comes, Vape News Magazine, and syndicated across the Johnston Press group. He was published in an anthology of “Greatest Football Writing”, but still believes this was a mistake. Dave contributes sketches to comedy shows and used to co-host a radio sketch show. He’s worked with numerous vape companies to develop content for their websites.
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