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New York State Bans E-Cigarettes Everywhere Traditional Cigarettes Are Prohibited (usatoday.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from USA Today: New York state is banning electronic cigarettes indoors everywhere that traditional tobacco cigarettes are prohibited, such as restaurants, bars and other workplaces. The ban goes into effect in 30 days, after Gov. Andrew Cuomo signed the Clean Indoor Air Act on Monday. About 70% of the state's cities already ban e-cigarettes, so the statewide policy captures the rest, according to the American Lung Association. Cuomo signed legislation in July that banned e-cigarettes in public and private schools. The industry, which the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates at $2.5 billion per year, contends that e-cigarettes are safer than traditional tobacco products. Smokers say inhaling the nicotine through a vapor produced by the devices helps them quit traditional cigarettes. But the New York State Health Department warned that vaping carries its own risks because the aerosol emissions can include formaldehyde, cadmium found in batteries, benzene found in gasoline and the industrial solvent toluene.

26 of 541 comments (clear)

  1. Sounds like fun by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    The aerosol emissions can include formaldehyde, cadmium found in batteries, benzene found in gasoline and the industrial solvent toluene. If that doesn't give you a buzz, then nothing will. Better than Testers glue. What's the problem?

    1. Re: Sounds like fun by omnichad · · Score: 4, Funny

      is going into your butt

      They don't have any butts. They're a non-smoker.

    2. Re:Sounds like fun by Opportunist · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The problem is: How is it your problem? I could see passive smoke in traditional cigarettes, but I'm still waiting for the "passive smoke" studies of vaping.

      --
      We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
    3. Re:Sounds like fun by Bert64 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Exactly, there are no studies indicating wether its harmful or not, therefore i would greatly prefer not to be inhaling a cocktail of chemicals which may have as yet unknown detrimental effects on my health.

      If you want to consume chemicals in a way which doesn't result in aerosolising them and forcing others to inhale them go right ahead.

      --
      http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
    4. Re:Sounds like fun by Opportunist · · Score: 3, Interesting

      There's a lot of things that I consider annoying in people, does that mean I get to forbid talking loudly, people scratching themselves in private places, people being obnoxious to the wait staff, children in general, people who are visibly sick but still handle my food, ...

      --
      We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
    5. Re:Sounds like fun by reboot246 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I feel the same way about your cologne and perfume. Why should I have to breathe those noxious chemicals because you like their fragrance? Some of you don't know how far your smell goes. I can smell some of you from a block away.

    6. Re:Sounds like fun by mjwx · · Score: 5, Insightful

      There's a lot of things that I consider annoying in people, does that mean I get to forbid talking loudly, people scratching themselves in private places, people being obnoxious to the wait staff, children in general, people who are visibly sick but still handle my food, ...

      Erm, no.

      If I scratch my nuts next to you, it doesn't affect you. Any issues you have with that are your problem. If someone starts smoking next to me, it DEFINITELY affects me. I'm an ex smoker, after 15 years of not smoking, if someone sparks up in a well ventilated room I will smell it within a minute. Yes smokers, its that bad. Now tell me that if someone has an itchy ball sack, you'll be able to tell if they've scratched it without seeing it.

      Now remember that anti-smoking laws ended up this way not because of health reasons, but because smokers were so annoying and intractable, if politely requested to take their habit elsewhere, they'd stamp their feet like an impudent child shouting "Its my right, my right, my right, my right, my right". So we took said rights away and they have no-one to blame but themselves.

      Sadly the same thing is happening with vapers. I think vaping is good as it's helped several of my friends and family members kick the habit and it looks like its for good this time but there are a large subset of vapers who have no idea of common courtesy and so we're ending up with the same problems as smokers for the same reasons. There's a reason the vape pipe is now colloquially known as a "douche flute".

      --
      Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
    7. Re:Sounds like fun by Opportunist · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Ok, and now for loud and obnoxious people, and how I don't hear them if I so please.

      --
      We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
    8. Re:Sounds like fun by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I feel the same way about your cologne and perfume. Why should I have to breathe those noxious chemicals because you like their fragrance? Some of you don't know how far your smell goes. I can smell some of you from a block away.

      Indeed, and as I suffer a fairly serious (to the verge of Anaphylaxis) reaction to some of the component chemicals of said colognes and perfumes, I'm more at risk from these than the vapours from vapers.

      I can't remember the name of the stuff, but many years ago I had the 'amusing' experience of being on a London tube train (Northern Line) when someone came on at one station wearing a rather nasty perfume (ISTR banned from a number of restaurants back then), the next station, the carriage emptied almost completely... I say amusing, but it took me something like 10 minutes to recover one I'd gotten to the surface, even what passes for London air was less toxic than this perfume.

    9. Re:Sounds like fun by Gavagai80 · · Score: 4, Informative

      There've been laws against being loud and obnoxious in public forever. Mainly targeted at drunks. There's even laws against standing perfectly still quietly not doing anything (loitering).

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      This space intentionally left blank
    10. Re:Sounds like fun by gnick · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Or, deity forbid, someone actually cares about the addicted n00bs injuring themselves so that an industry can profit?

      I do not need nor want help keeping me safe from myself.

      --
      He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
    11. Re:Sounds like fun by TheCastro1689 · · Score: 3, Informative

      There are: Our data confirm that e-cigarettes are not emission-free and their pollutants could be of health concern for users and secondhand smokers. In particular, ultrafine particles formed from supersaturated 1,2-propanediol vapor can be deposited in the lung, and aerosolized nicotine seems capable of increasing the release of the inflammatory signaling molecule NO upon inhalation. In view of consumer safety, e-cigarettes and nicotine liquids should be officially regulated and labeled with appropriate warnings of potential health effects, particularly of toxicity risk in children. http://www.sciencedirect.com/s...

    12. Re:Sounds like fun by JackieBrown · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Or, deity forbid, someone actually cares about the addicted n00bs injuring themselves

      No one is asking you for this help.

      What other potentially dangerous activities do you want to protect us from? Sky diving? Deep sea diving? Walking across streets? Leaving our homes?

      so that an industry can profit?

      I really want to ignore this because it's such a transparently bs "evil corp boogeyman" argument - especially when talking about the vape industry. The destruction of the vape industry will just push most vapers to smoking regular cigarettes and just make big tobacco that much wealthier. And honestly, if I buy from a non-profit vape store, then do I have your permission to vape in public?

    13. Re:Sounds like fun by BasilBrush · · Score: 5, Insightful

      That would be misguided then. Ecigs are such a fantastic thing because people can relatively easily more from tobacco cigarettes to them, and whilst they may not be perfectly safe they are far, far more safe than smoking. They should be encouraged, not discouraged.

      My bet is that lobbying from the tobacco industry is responsible for this crackdown on ecigs.

  2. Re:Nanny State by omnichad · · Score: 5, Insightful

    This is the will of the people - not nannying. Your rights end in my personal space. Do whatever you want at home or outside, but not next to me in a crowded building.

  3. Re:Nanny State by damn_registrars · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Don't do this and don't do that. 'Cause we know what's best for you and we're gonna pass laws that make you conform.

    That's an overstatement, there. The law isn't telling people they can't do it, rather it is saying that the rest of society has the right to not be exposed to it involuntarily (as is also the case with regular tobacco smoke). You can still smoke it in your private home, or in your private car, or in other private places. Those who are intelligent enough to not smoke this should not be forcibly exposed to the toxic brew that is produces.

    --
    Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
  4. Re:Why the nicotine hate by mysidia · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The hate is people around people who like nicotine have the right to make a personal decision to not use the drug.
    Fine if you utilize nicotine in a manner that does not expose other people to nicotine vapors.

  5. Re:Nanny State by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The right to allow vaping or not belongs to the proprietor, not "the people," no matter how lopsided the vote. If I permit vaping in my bar and you choose not to be around it, that's your prerogative -- the prerogative to set policy on my property is mine.

  6. Re: Nanny State by Jesus+H+Rolle · · Score: 3, Interesting

    As a former smoker, I don't care whatsoever if someone vapes around me, even if they're in my home.

  7. IMHO by PinkyGigglebrain · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Good.

    An eCig may not have most of the crap (tar, etc.) a normal cig has but it still has nicotine, and I would rather not have to inhale the stuff if I can avoid it.

    If you want to ingest a highly addictive and deadly drug fine by me. Just don't do it in an aerosol form around people who have chosen not to ingest the aforementioned drug.

  8. Re:Nanny State by Richard_at_work · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Can you sell alcohol indiscriminately in this theoretical bar...? Can you decide to sell it to 15 year olds?

  9. Re:Nanny State by AK+Marc · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I don't care if you think it's safe, I don't want it. If you could do it without exhaling and all the second hand vape, people wouldn't mind. I don't want to know that today is your caramel day and yesterday was peppermint. You stench may be pleasing to you, but nobody else, and your figurative fist is touching my literal nose. Isn't that the libertarian line in the sand?

  10. Re:Nanny State by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Because vaping, much like sneezing, is a normal bodily function.

  11. Re:Nanny State by thegarbz · · Score: 5, Insightful

    So what you're saying is "No but {insert irrelevant strawman}"

    When do we ban cars?

    Cigarettes and cars have different utility and contribute differently to the economy. If cars only existed to kill its occupants we'd have banned them long ago. ... You didn't think this was a single variable decision did you? Shame on your simple mindedness.

    So now that they have deemed vapor a harmful pollutant. Are we going to ban restaurants who bring out a nice piping hot plate of food releasing its steam vapor?

    I stand corrected. You're not simple minded at all. You're obtusely dense and don't want to think about the differences in your examples.

    After all someone might be allergic to something in that steam.

    Allergies are irrelevant to the discussion. Please stay on topic.

    Or offended by the smell of cooked pork.

    Offence is irrelevant to the discussion. Please stay on topic.

    With the number of rich jews...

    There we go, now it all comes out. Whatever credibility you had left in the discussion (very little mind you) you just pissed against the wall. Now off you fuck.

  12. Balance by buss_error · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I am an ex-smoker of tobacco. I know how the fiend that rides the back of a smoker can crawl up the back of your neck, reach it's talons around, and rip off your face when you need that next smoke. All too well, do I know it. I also know the anti-tobacco evangelists, trying to "do good". Let me give you a hint: You are annoying and irritating. Your urgings to quit this filthily habit moved me not one iota until I had my first heart attack. You see, smoking isn't rational. It's deeply emotional and addiction based. If you aren't addicted, you have zero chance of understanding it, and worse, a negative chance to change others. People that are addicted have to choose to change. Logic, proof, and all the AMA studies in the world won't move a truly addicted person one angstrom. Yes - it's not logical. But it is human nature.

    I've chewed nicotine gum now for about the last 12 years. My addiction to nicotine continues, albeit in a form that (hopefully) doesn't affect others, like smoking tobacco or vaping does. When I pass the smoking area, I wonder now how I could ever have desired it. And yet, I still feel the pull for "one last good smoke" - which I don't give into.

    Vaping, just as smoking, puts chemicals in the air. No difference there.

    To my mind, making your own hell is up to you. But including others in your damnation is not your right. If your actions put nicotine in the air others must breathe, such as smoking and vaping, then your right to do so ends at the effective boundary of others to avoid your chosen vice.

    And again, I completely understand that critter that wants to rip your face off. I suffer from it to this day and I've not had a cigarette in over a decade. But your right to partake does not include the right to force others to imbibe in your vice as well. All I ask is that you consider how you'd feel of others felt they could force you to breathe flatulence. I doubt you'd be best pleased.

    --
    Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.
  13. GOOD! by p51d007 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    If you can't light up a tobacco product, you shouldn't be able to "puff away" a fake cigarette. I can't wait until someone legalizes marijuana and some doper wants to "blaze up" in a bar/restaurant, and is told NO.