Comment & News
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Stateside Comment US Correspondent Catherine Levin reports on the growing use of e-cigarettes and lack of safety advice
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ew York is a healthy city and you rarely see anyone smoking on the street. The sight of office workers huddled outside buildings, fag in hand, is not as common as it is in the UK, mostly because there are officious looking signs outside most buildings banning smoking within many metres of doorways. A while back, I was sat on the New York subway and was shocked to see a young woman smoking until I realised it was an e-cigarette. E-cigarettes come in lots of enticing flavours and are readily available in corner shops here if you can prove you are over 21. In New York City we live in a
strange land where e-cigarettes are now banned in places where regular cigarettes were already prohibited; we are in a State which was the first to legislate for fire safer cigarettes and yet pharmacies are permitted to sell tobacco alongside products promoting better health. It’s a curious contradiction and one that pharmacy chain CVS is addressing as it will no longer sell cigarettes and tobacco products from October 1. Whether this is a health conscious move or a deliberate attempt to differentiate itself from its main competitor, Duane Reade, only time will tell, but hopefully they will follow suit. E-cigarettes periodically hit the headlines here because some people smoke them when in the vicinity of oxygen products. I read of one case, in upstate New York, of a patient who suffered facial burns from ear to ear when in hospital using oxygen and smoking an e-cigarette. That hospital has now banned e-cigarettes, although it’s hard to believe they allowed them in the first place. USA Today punned rather
“What is lacking here in the US is a concerted public information campaign about the dangers of fire from e-cigarettes” badly when it proclaimed in June that “the market for e-cigarettes is exploding, with an average of ten new brands entering the market every month for the last two years”. And one of the problems is just that: e-cigarettes can explode during use and through misuse of the USB chargers, which, according to the Tobacco Vapour Electronic Cigarette Association, can go through an astonishing 750,000 charge cycles in one year. The US Food and Drug Administration recently concluded its public consultation on extending its authority to cover e-cigarettes. It noted that “once the proposed rule becomes final, the FDA will be able to use powerful regulatory tools, such as age restrictions and rigorous scientific review of new tobacco products and claims to reduce tobacco-related disease and death.” Such regulation must be a
good thing in terms of better health outcomes but what is lacking here in the US is a concerted public information campaign about the dangers of fire from e-cigarettes. I couldn’t find any information from the US Fire Administration or from any of the other well-known fire focused organisations. So it’s good to see CFOA quick off the mark with its advice to oxygen users after the fatality reported in Merseyside in August which was connected with charging an e-cigarette. Although such advice is not exclusive to those using oxygen, the wider fire risks associated with charging devices needs a wider information campaign. Perhaps when the FDA regulations hit home, fire focused organisations in the US will follow suit with their own public awareness campaigns but until then we can expect to see more news reports like the ones above.
Amputees in Action celebrate tenth anniversary Amputees in Action have celebrated their tenth year anniversary celebrations at the historic Shaw House in Newbury, Berkshire
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ohn Pickup, Managing Director of Amputees in Action, gave a speech to guests at the event about the company’s achievements over the last ten years. He started by defining how Amputees in Action is currently seeing huge demand for providing actors for film and TV industry. Amputees in Action have subsequently grown their Defence Division with major contract wins for large defence clients in the UK and Europe. This has resulted in Amputees in Action working with various
European military establishments including the MoD. John highlighted the importance of recent work undertaken by Amputees in Action within the emergency services sector, which included in May 2014 supporting the London Fire Brigade in the largest and most comprehensive exercise in its history – a threeday exercise based around a plane crash in the capital. Amputees in Action provided actors and special effects artists to create simulated crush, burn and major trauma injuries. It
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was a unique opportunity for the blue light services to work together effectively to practise the life-saving skills in realistic scenarios, that would be used should a major incident ever occur. During the evening it was announced how Amputees in Action is now applying its casualty training simulation expertise to cover extreme working environments. The party was a great success and guests included staff, friends, journalists and local MP Richard Benyon. The night
included a raffle and honesty bar raising £379.36. This was matched by Amputees in Action making the total £758.72 for the charity Legs 4 Africa. The money goes towards helping with their next adventure to provide prosthetic limbs to amputees in Africa. The company’s latest growth will see them represented at the inaugural Excellence in Fire & Emergency Awards on October 17 – to find out more about why AiA is proud to sponsor the ‘Team of the Year’ category see page 32.