Phones Laptops Cameras Tablets Headphones Smartwatches VR Headsets This is my NextThe UK official statistics bureau, the Office of National Statistics, has published new official smoking and vaping stats for 2014, with the bonus of an e-cigarette survey for 2015.The geographical base is Great Britain (GB) – the difference between Great Britain and the United Kingdom is Northern Ireland.The age range is ≥16.Pretty good news… Source materials from ONS If you like your data in spreadsheets, the new official smoking and e-cigarette statistics are here: Opinions and Lifestyle Survey, Adult smoking habits in Great Britain, 2014 The report is accessible here: Adult smoking habits in Great Britain 2014 (PDF) The datasets are here (Excel) And there is a graphics report here: Most people use e-cigarettes to help them quit smoking A SlideShare pack is here: Do e-cigarettes help smokers kick the habit?Some highlights I’ve looked into it so you don’t have to….

here are some statistical nuggets from the 2015 data on e-cigarettes.There are 8.8m smokers in Britain 2.20 million people are using e-cigarettes – almost all are smokers (1.30m or 59%) or ex-smokers (849k – 39%) – with a few never-smokers (56k – 2.5%).A grand total of 8.7m Brits have used or tried e-cigs: 2.2m current users; 3.9m former users; 2.6m tried but did not go on to use e-cigs 64% of current smokers have tried an e-cigarette and 15% are currently e-cig users – to me this represents future public health potential Only 0.2% of never-smokers are current e-cigarette users – these are the same people as the 2.5% of e-cig users who never smoked.Even so – and funnily enough – 39% of these never-smokers said they used e-cigarettes as an aid to quit smoking (a reminder that this may not be an exact science!)Female e-cigarette current use is slightly higher (4.5%) than male (4.2%) Peak prevalence in men is age 55-64 (5.8%) but younger in women 35-44 (6.7%) Two main reasons are given for using e-cigarettes: perceived as safer than smoking (22%) and as an aid to stop smoking (53%) – note that these could both be true for many users.

Only 9% say they use e-cigarettes because they can be used indoors Two-thirds (67%) of e-cigarette users are daily users Only 23% of e-cigarette users use cig-a-likes (devices that look like cigarettes) Risk perceptions – interestingly ONS subdivided perceptions into ‘much less‘ and ‘somewhat less‘ harmful – which is good, because magnitude matters.These are the perception figures for all current and ex-smokers who have not used e-cigarettes: 29% – Much less harmful than cigarettes 39% – Somewhat less harmful than cigarettes 24% – About as harmful as cigarettes These are the risk perception figures for current and former e-cigarette users – neatly illustrating how experience changes perception: 43% – Much less harmful than cigarettes 33% – Somewhat less harmful than cigarettes 18% – About as harmful as cigarettes 59% all persons ≥16 believe that e-cigarettes have no health impact on non-users, 37% believe a damaging impact.

Many other figures and breakdowns in the data sources listed above.This is all mostly pretty good news.e cigarette shop redditchIn particular, 850k ex-smokers are currently using e-cigs and a further 720k ex-smokers used e-cigs in the past but no longer.vaporizer albuterolThis is a substantial proportion of the smoking population over the period in which e-cigs have been rising.vape shop virginia beachNote that we cannot say they are ex-smokers because they used e-cigarettes.The important thing is that they are ex-smokers.It may also be that e-cig use is valuable in preventing relapse.What’s the bad news?I think the main reason for concern is the persistent misperception of vaping risk – most people think it is much more dangerous than is plausible based on what we know of the chemistry and physics of e-liquid vapour and cigarette smoke.

Less than one-third of those in the most at-risk category (smokers / ex-smokers who have not tried e-cigs) have a realistic perception of the risk of  e-cigarettes (i.e.‘much less harmful’ than cigarettes) and even among users less than half have realistic perceptions (and are likely to be more at risk of relapse as a result – if you are struggling to make vaping work, why would you bother if you don’t think the risk is that much lower?I guess we can thank the wildly irresponsible statements from public health academic and commentators and extensive slovenly journalism for this unhappy state of affairs – and the resultant protection of the cigarette trade from the competitive threat of superior new consumer technology.What’s going on with smoking?Here’s the trend, just plotted from the data released… Note, the 2015 e-cigarette survey shows smoking prevalence continuing to fall – to 17.5%.This is from a different dataset to the one plotted above, so I haven’t added it to this chart.

But this is how it would look.Commentary Watch Hazel Cheeseman of ASH (London) and Professor Peter Hajek of Queen Mary College discuss the results and the issues raised in the debate – this is very good.Note to American, Canadian, Australian and WHO tobacco control activists: this is what honest discussion of e-cigarettes sounds like.Credit: TBEC Review/Flickr via CC-BY-2.0 An estimated 2.6 million people now use e-cigarettes in the UK.And this rapid rise in popularity – along with the huge range of products on sale – has meant that research on the devices has struggled to keep up.It’s no surprise then that e-cigarettes have become a bit of a contentious public health issue, with vapers, scientists and the media all debating the potential positive or negative consequences of their use.As we’ve previously said, e-cigarettes are almost certainly far safer than tobacco cigarettes.But the only way to settle this debate – and to realise their potential – is through research.

Long-term, high-quality studies are crucial to provide reliable evidence about these products’ effects on our behaviour, physiology and health, and allow us to continue to provide evidence-based recommendations to policy makers.And since policy makers in the UK are already facing legislative decisions around e-cigarettes, the planning about what research to do has to happen now.With so much to gain if e-cigarettes are proven to help people ditch tobacco, we’re making research on e-cigarettes a key priority.So let’s take a look at the research we’re already funding, and how we’re working with the research community to identify new questions to answer.It’s important to point out that we already fund research on e-cigarettes.In fact, we’ve recently increased our budget for e-cigarette research, with an additional £5 million via both our Tobacco Advisory Group, and our Population Research Committee.This means we’ve been able to fund an extra 12 research projects.This includes exciting new research on how young adults understand and experience the devices; their impact in people with mental illness; and a long-term study looking at ‘real-world’ examples of how e-cigarettes may help people quit smoking.

These projects will help answer some of the burning questions on e-cigarettes.But what else do we need to know?To find out, we held two workshops earlier this year in collaboration with the British Lung Foundation (BLF), British Heart Foundation (BHF), the Department of Health, the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), the Medical Research Council (MRC) and the Wellcome Trust..The workshops were themed around research that would look at how e-cigarettes work, and what happens when people use the devices.And we brought together scientists, health professionals, policy-makers and representatives from the vaping community to discuss the key research questions.The workshops were aimed at understanding what we already know, and identifying the key research gaps in this area.And a number of key priority areas for future research were raised for further consideration: We’ll also be working with the workshop partners and other funders, including the British Lung Foundation (BLF) and the Wellcome Trust, to promote our existing funding streams to e-cigarette researchers.

As well as the workshop, we’ve also been working with Public Health England on the new UK Electronic Cigarette Research Forum (UKECRF), which has established a network of researchers, policy makers and practitioners to discuss research relating to electronic cigarettes and how this relates to policy.The UKECRF is chaired by Professor Ann McNeill from the UK Centre for Tobacco and Alcohol Studies.And we’ve been working with the University of Stirling to provide a series of monthly updates to this network on new research as it emerges.Another way we’ve been working with other funding organisations to create additional resources that may help e-cigarette research, is with the Cohort Directory – a list of ongoing large UK population studies that could provide useful data to researchers studying e-cigarettes.Created by the MRC, in collaboration with us, BHF, ESRC, and the Wellcome Trust, the directory helps researchers and policymakers find and use them more easily.It’s absolutely vital that people are made aware of any potential tobacco industry involvement with e-cigarettes To fully capitalise on e-cigarettes’ potential, while minimising any risks, we clearly need a better understanding of their impact.