Rod Liddle Rod Liddle

The BMA’s bizarre jihad against e-cigarettes

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issue 21 September 2013

What strategy should we adopt to cope with the British Medical Association? Its members kill more people each year than President Assad — 72,000 is the latest estimate, from the House of Commons health select committee. Perhaps it is at last time to sit down and negotiate with them, much though this will stick in the craw, like a misplaced scalpel. We say that organisations like the IRA and the BMA will ‘never win’ and that we will ‘never negotiate’ – but this is empty rhetoric, because we always end up doing so. If we could just reduce by 10 per cent the number of people killed every year through medical errors it would at least bring the figure below the combined annual deaths attributed to smoking and drinking and obesity. That’s something to aim for, isn’t it? Attempt to find some common ground with the more moderate elements and then persuade them to put down their weapons.

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