New York vaping ban shows ignorance of policymakers

New York City’s indoor vaping ban went into effect the other day. As I’ve said before these kind of bans really don’t bother me because as smokers we should be used to having to go outside by now. What does bother me is when these bans are made on foundations of ignorance.

Dr. Thomas Farley, the New York City health commissioner under former Mayor Michael Bloomberg, says allowing electronic cigarettes in bars and restaurants would undermine existing bans on tobacco-based products.

“Imagine for a moment you’re at a bar and there are 20 people who are puffing on something that looks like a cigarette and then somebody smells something that smells like tobacco smoke,” Farley says. “How’s the bartender going to know who to tap on the shoulder and say, ‘put that out’?”

Emphasis mine.

Really, so you think that no one can tell the difference between an e-cig or vaping and a tobacco cigarette? How about tap the shoulder of the guy who is flicking ash everywhere or the one whose cigarette keeps getting shorter? Or how about the one that smells like an actual cigarette? Cigarette smoke has a very distinct smell while vaping, if it has any smell at all, is very subtle. Vapor also doesn’t cloud up like cigarette smoke or cling to everything like smoke does.

But what do you expect from a city government that thinks regulating the size of soft drinks solves anything?