Should electronic cigarettes be as freely available as tobacco cigarettes? No

Amid the feverish embrace of electronic cigarettes, come several statements by the tobacco industry that should cause public health proponents of such products to get a grip. For example, the chief executive of Reynolds America told shareholders in November 2012, just six months before entering the e-cigarette market, “We have a little mantra inside of the company . . . which we call the 80-90-90 . . . We spend about 80% of our resources in the combustible space. The combustible space is still 80%, 80+% of our operating income . . . [and] 90% of the organizational focus . . . And despite a lot of these new innovations that you see coming out, 90% of our R&D [research and development] budgets are actually directed at the combustible category . . . That is the category that’s still going …