My Name is Marcus Gunn, I am 43 years old and I started smoking when I was 12 years old. I was raised in a household where my Father, Grandfather, grandmother, uncles and aunt’s all smoked. Never really gave it a second thought as far as my health was concerned. As I became older and more concerned about my health, I spent YEARS trying EVERYTHING on the market to quit smoking and NOTHING worked. I tried the gums, patches and even pharmaceuticals such as Chantix and NOTHING worked. In fact, while taking Chantix, I had horrible nightmares, suffered from SEVERE depression and suicidal thoughts. At the age of 34, while working my job, I suffered a back injury and found out that I have degenerative disc disease and had to undergo a series of surgeries which included spinal fusion which left me permanently disabled. After a few years of sitting around and not being able to do much of ANYTHING, I gained massive amounts of weight and ended up suffering a major heart attack. My doctors told me that unless I quit smoking and lost weight I probably wouldn’t live to be 50 years of age. This was one month prior to my 40th birthday. So now, not only did I want to quit smoking, I HAD TO QUIT!!! As previously stated, I had already tried EVERYTHING on the market to no success, then I found e-cigarettes. I ordered a kit and the VERY FIRST DAY I started using it I never touched another cigarette. VAPING SAVED MY LIFE!!! I had Gastric Bypass surgery, lost 200 lbs, quit smoking,had a few more back surgeries and now my doctors tell me that I can look forward to a long healthy life. I am in the best health I have been in since before I started smoking and my children are happy that I will be around for a long time. I AM PROOF THAT VAPING WORKS AND IS A HEALTHIER ALTERNATIVE TO SMOKING!!!!! I would even show my health records and just by looking at those you can see EXACTLY when I started vaping. I got off of cigs all because of vaping and I didn’t even use tobacco flavors, I vape fruit flavors or mint or caramel or whatever flavor I crave that day. Vaping even helped with my weight loss because instead of eating sweets, I can have a sweet flavored vape and curb that craving. I can honestly say that Vaping saved my life!!!
Advocating for Tobacco Harm Reduction
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The 5th Circuit blocks the FDA's attempt to pull menthol e-cigarettes off the market, saying the agency's de facto ban on flavored vaping products is probably illegal. https://reason.com/2023/03/24/the-5th-circuit-rebukes-the-fda-for-flouting-the-law-while-imposing-a-de-facto-ban-on-flavored-e-cigarettes/
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🚨 NEWS ALERT 🚨
Tomorrow at 1PM Eastern, AVM’s @alli_vapes and @GregTHR will host @FDAtobacco director Brian King for a one-hour, live discussion including direct questions from the vape community. Register to access the zoom feed:
https://theavm.org/the-future-of-vaping-in-the-us