By Deanna Marshall, Hamilton
In 2015 vape shops across Montana showed up in Helena to help pass a bill that would separate vaping products from tobacco products, because there is no tobacco in vaping products. We were able to get that into law.
I would agree that to some, vaping may be generally distasteful. Vaping simulates the act of smoking. We have been socially programmed to be repulsed by secondhand smoking and other actions related to tobacco use. The appearance of vaping conjures these preprogrammed responses. The fact that vaping simulates smoking is why people switch and are able to quit tobacco.
Vape shops have helped thousands of Montanan’s quit the deadly habit of tobacco use. And more each day, choose the better alternative of vaping to quit smoking.
The simple fact is, vaping has been proven to be 95% less harmful than cigarettes, See The Royal Collage of Physicians Study titled “Nicotine Without Smoke: Tobacco Harm Reduction”.
I 185 has included vaping products into this bill as “other tobacco products”. I-185 is asking for a new 83% tax on these lifesaving products and to redefine them as tobacco products. It will be devastating to shop owners across Montana. If passed, it would make it less expensive to smoke, than to choose a better alternative. Therefore, the hardworking shop owners, whom are not Big Tobacco companies, will suffer and possibly be shut down, and people with good jobs will be on the unemployment line.
We are NOT tobacco.
Please vote NO on I-185.