The New York City Council has waved its magic wand again, proposing another treacherous legislation, with a 43-8 unanimous vote, over a contentious bill that preceded their arbitrary decision. Banning e-cigarettes in all locations where traditional smoking is prohibited. This legislation was backed by the Health Security Commissioner Thomas Farley, the Council Speaker Christine Quinn and the outgoing infamous Mayer Michael Bloomberg.
E-cigarettes are slim battery operated metal-tube reusable devices, it’s laced with liquid nicotine that releases a chemically infused vapor when the device is puffed on. It comes in a myriad of flavors, such as bubblegum, cherry, strawberry and bacon. (Vaporized nicotine with artificial flavors, “Sounds like your cancer will get diabetes!”)
The City Councils major contention is that the flavor infused devices are enticing and could potentially attract children and adolescents; Really? (Candid moment). Then why isn’t flavored condoms inducing promiscuity amongst juveniles? I would assume a sexual epidemic would inevitably fluctuate the City. How does one muster up to such faulty logic?
Differentiating between the e-cigarettes and traditional cigarettes are indistinguishable, and it can harbor or insinuate the normalization and acceptability of what’s deemed prohibited. However, inconveniencing the usage can counterproductively resurge users back to traditional smoking. Why intercept a cheaper alternative with fewer toxins, that is an indirect segue-way to curbing a habit?
The World Health Organization also stressed that the adverse effect of vaporized nicotine and its secondary-inhalation is still unknown. The FDA says the e-cigarettes may contain two basic chemicals found in regular cigarettes, toxins and carcinogens. The former is an antigenic, a toxin that suppresses antibodies and reduces the immune systems responsibility, and the latter is a substance know to cause lung cancer in the tissues.
An escalating $2 billion industry in 2013, a value almost doubled its preceding year, a less than 5% figure than that of the $80 billion tobacco industry. Ironically, based on its five year inception and exponential growth, it’ll unassailably surpass the popularity of traditional smoking. An unregulated chemically-infused device that hasn’t been FDA approved.
The age purchasing minimum of tobacco cigarettes we’re raised from 18 to 21, a preceding enactment signed into law by the Mayor, and prior to that, “The Smoke Free Air Act of 2002” (SFAA) prohibiting smoking in all workplaces, and the promotion of a smoke-free environment.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg seems to be departing with a precarious bang indeed, once again instilling his barbed residue of a vengeance behind, stringing along his entourage of political lemmings to battle the continuum of debris. Passing a legislation as a precautionary measure seems well-intentioned; Ironically, using safety as a prohibitive way to circumvent a scientifically unsupported claim seems rather rogue.
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