UPDATE 10:30 a.m. 8/3/2015: The Howard County Council unanimously passed the proposed ban.
EARLIER: WASHINGTON — Another D.C.-area locality is deciding whether e-cigarettes should be treated like聽tobacco products.
Howard聽County is considering a proposal to ban vaping in places smoking is not allowed, similar to a law recently passed in Montgomery County.
The American Cancer Society鈥檚 Cancer Action Network supports the proposal. The聽American Vaping Association supports some regulation — “There’s no reason to sell these products to anyone under the age of 18,” says AVA president Gregory Conley 鈥� but says the county’s focus should be聽on tobacco.
“You probably have 18 percent of adults in Howard County smoking,鈥� Conley says, 鈥渟o let’s invest in ways to help them quit.”
Continuing to allow vaping in places smoking has been banned would be a step back, says Bonita Pennino with the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network.
“The devices keep people smoking rather than quit – which is reversing the efforts we’ve made over the years to make smoking socially unacceptable,” Pennino says.
The groups also are divided on the issue of whether e-cigarettes pose any risk from secondhand exposure.
“We don’t know what chemicals are in electronic cigarettes,” Pennino says.聽Conley says the tiny and trace levels of chemicals that e-cigarettes do contain are not harmful to bystanders.
The American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network expressed a similar sentiment.
鈥淎CS CAN has significant concerns about the potential public health effects of e-cigarettes. E鈥恈igarette emissions may contain nicotine and other potentially harmful chemicals. A growing number of studies have examined the contents of e鈥恈igarette aerosol,” the agency said in a news release.
is being considered by聽a聽Prince George’s County Council committee.聽In the District, Council member Yvette Alexander may propose a similar measure.
The American Vaping Association believes聽restricting聽e-cigs聽will prove聽costly.
“We as a society we should want to incentivize in some way switching from a product that causes 400,000 deaths a year and puts massive pressure on our medical system, to a smoke-free and tobacco-free product,” he says.
“If you want to use this device, do what everyone else is doing that smokes cigarettes — step outside,” Pennino says.
The Howard County Council vote on e-cigarettes could happen Friday.
