NYC Vape-In

Panning the ban

At the end of April, New York City's ban on smoking e-cigarettes in bars, offices, and other so-called public places went into effect. In response to the scheduled ban reason co-hosted a "Vape-in" at the Museum of Sex in Manhattan, where participants defied the authority of their paternalistic lawmakers at the stroke of midnight and celebrated the benefits of increasingly popular e-cigarettes, which are now being sold by tobacco companies.

Speaking to Reason TV at the vape-in Bill Godshall of Smokefree Pennsylvania said, "I think these products are just as important for public health as childhood vaccines and antibiotics and sewage treatment and water treatment."

Despite e-cigarettes' effectiveness at helping smokers of old-style cigarettes quit, critics insist that vaping products must be strictly regulated or even prohibited to send the message that orally delivered nicotine is bad.

A few days before the NYC ban came into effect the Food and Drug Administration, which tried to ban the sale of e-cigarettes in 2009, proposed subjecting each new e-cigarette product to agency approval.