%0 Journal Article
%T From Smoking To Vaping: what does judaism have to say? What Does Judaism Have To Say? - From Smoking To Vaping: what does judaism have to say? What Does Judaism Have To Say? - Open Access Pub
%A Akiva Turner
%J OAP | Home | Journal of Public Health International | Open Access Pub
%D 2019
%X The author reviews rabbinic decisions about smoking from a historical perspective along with the positions of the medical community. The author then brings the current, though limited, rabbinic considerations about vaping given the current state of science, as well as possible discussions for the future, as more becomes known about the safety and health risks associated with vaping. DOI10.14302/issn.2641-4538.jphi-20-3163 Today a great deal is known about the harms of smoking and tobacco use. In the United States, the main cause of preventable disease, disability, and death is the use of tobacco. According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), ¡°as of 2017, about 34 million US adults smoke cigarettes. Every day, about 2,000 young people under age 18 smoke their first cigarette, and more than 300 become daily cigarette smokers. Over 16 million people live with at least one disease caused by smoking, and 58 million nonsmoking Americans are exposed to secondhand smoke.¡± 1 At the same time, huge strides have been made in preventing tobacco use. However, the harms of tobacco use, particularly smoking, were not always known to the public. According to the American Cancer Society: (I). It wasn¡¯t even until cigarettes were mass produced and popularized by manufacturers in the first part of the 20th century that there was cause for alarm. Prior to the 1900s, lung cancer was a rare disease. Turn-of-the-century changes though, gave way to an era of rapidly increasing lung cancer rates. New technology allowed cigarettes to be produced on a large scale, and advertising glamorized smoking. The military got in on it too ¨C giving cigarettes out for free to soldiers during World Wars I and II. Cigarette smoking increased rapidly through the 1950s, becoming much more widespread. Per capita cigarette consumption soared from 54 per year in 1900, to 4,345 per year in 1963. And, lung cancer went from rarity to more commonplace ¨C by the early 1950s it became ¡°the most common cancer diagnosed in American men. 2 Further, it was not until the late 1950s and into the early 1960s, after the completion of large scale studies, that the connection between smoking and cancer became widely accepted. While this change in scientific knowledge profoundly affected medicine and public health, it has also affected the rulings on the part of rabbinic decision makers regarding the religious permissibility or impermissibility of smoking or using tobacco products. Rabbinic decision makers base rulings or decisions on halacha (Jewish Law). Halacha is a body of codes and laws that come from the
%U https://www.openaccesspub.org/jphi/article/1248