I magine we’d found a way to get millions of people to switch from alcohol, which in this country kills 10,000 people a year, to another kind of sub

In the moral panic over vaping, we risk forgetting that cigarettes kill

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2024-11-10 13:00:03

I magine we’d found a way to get millions of people to switch from alcohol, which in this country kills 10,000 people a year, to another kind of substance: still addictive, still not risk-free, but when compared with the booze, pretty harmless. Coffee, say.

A public health miracle is hailed. Liver units are empty. Heart surgeons spend more time on the golf course, and costly government prevention programmes close. Millions chink into NHS coffers.

But now, imagine a hitch. Amid all this, a coffee fad has taken hold in schools – every chance they get, kids are slipping off to sip on lattes in a range of disgustingly sweet flavours. Parents worry: caffeine is bad for the developing brain. And then some evidence emerges that a couple of chemicals produced in the roasting process are possible carcinogens – but mostly in far higher doses than in the average coffee cup. Results are not conclusive.

From these seeds, a panic takes hold, and grows. What to do? You make it illegal to sell coffee to under-18s, but children are still getting hold of it. So what next? Drive up coffee taxes? Outlaw advertising? Put coffee in plain packaging? Forbid coffee on trains and in the street? Ban all but the bitterest brands?

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