Vaping isn't perfectly safe - and?

The latest piece of medical hysteria about vaping has arrived - with the finding that the consumption of a stimulant restricts the aorta. This apparently is sufficient to mean that vaping should be banned, or at least restricted, and therefore many more people should die from smoking:

Vaping could be as bad for the heart as smoking cigarettes, a new study suggests. 

The findings triggered warnings that electronic cigarettes may be “far more dangerous” than was thought.

Trials found that a typical session using a device caused similar effects to the main heart artery as smoking a cigarette.

This is not in fact a stunning finding. Stimulants tend to do this:

Researchers said a a typical vaping session had a similar impact on stiffness of the aorta - the main artery into the heart - as smoking one regular cigarette.

Lead researcher Prof Charalambos Vlachopoulos, from the University of Athens Medical School said: "We measured aortic stiffness. If the aorta is stiff you multiply your risk of dying, either from heart diseases or from other causes.”

Nicotine is a stimulant, stimulants tend to do this, nicotine will do this. 

As our friends at the IEA have pointed out, this isn't the point about vaping anyway. We have a stimulant that large numbers of people enjoy, a stimulant which is legal and a stimulant which will kill some large percentage of those who partake of it. Vaping is a safer, not safe, manner of taking that stimulant.

Of course it should be legal. In fact, given the greater safety it should be subsidised in theory.

It's worth noting that those nicotine patches, which we do subsidise through prescriptions, have very much the same effect on the heart. Because they're a nicotine delivery system and nicotine is a stimulant.....