Mark Pawsey MP , who chairs the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Vaping , said : “ Increasingly vaping and smoking are getting conflated . There are too many places where it says that vaping and smoking are as bad as each other and we know they are very different activities . “ Leaving the EU , we can form our own policy on this and continue the reduction in smoking that is helping so many people .” The forum also praised the work being done by the National Health Service to promote vaping as an alternative to smoking . Mark Oates , director of consumer organisation We Vape , said the influence of the NHS could not be underestimated when it came to encouraging people to switch from smoking to vaping . Dr Sudhanshu Patwardhan , from the Centre for Health Research and Education , revealed that a recent survey of health workers , including smoking cessation staff , showed that almost half wrongly believed that nicotine caused cancer . He said this underlined that there is still too much misinformation which needs addressing , both among health care professionals and the public in general . How we can improve vaping ’ s image was another key topic of the event . Senior trading standards officer Jo Mahoney said one of vaping ’ s biggest and most enduring image problems was the public perception that children and young people were too easily able to access vaping products . She said that organisations like the UKVIA had a ‘ vital role to play ’ in demonstrating , and communicating to the public and politicians what the wider industry was doing to prevent youth access . John Dunne added : “ It was brilliant to once again be able to get into a room with so many forward thinking people to look at what has been achieved in the last 12 months . “ We must now steel our resolve for the coming year and do all we can collaboratively to promote our industry and get even more smokers to switch to vaping .”
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“ We must now steel our resolve for the coming year and do all we can collaboratively to promote our industry and get even more smokers to switch to vaping .
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