Following SVT's report on young people and road construction, reactions from road users and entrepreneurs have been pouring in on Facebook.
"It is better for young people to vape instead of smoking tobacco, which is carcinogenic and harmful to health," writes a user from Borlänge to SVT.
SVT Västerbotten recently highlighted that increasing use of e-cigarettes among young people in Umeå. The focus was on disposable models and the targeting of young people and children by so-called 'nicotine companies' in their marketing. Well-known anti-tobacco commentators spoke out and an official at Region Västerbotten pointed to flavours as the main reason for the increase.
Great attention on Facebook
The reaction on social media was immediate. Within a few hours, discussions raged on SVT Västerbotten and on Swedish vejpforum. At the time of writing, the post has 155 comments.
"Since when did candy, fruit and other sweet flavours become automatically targeted at children? Yes, there are problems with operators who don't give a damn about who buys and uses. Would it not be appropriate to criticise the state here?" writes the user Fredrik Kristianssen in a comment on SVT Värmland's Facebook page.
According to Fredrik Kristianssen it is more serious that flavoured alcohol is openly available on the market.
"Better that they vape than smoke"
The writer Torbjörn Vendestad believes that the message about the harm of nicotine and smoking has been lost. He believes that young people have always engaged in forbidden activities such as smoking cigarettes and drinking alcohol.
"It is better for young people to vape instead of smoking tobacco, which is carcinogenic and harmful to health. People in general need to start differentiating between nicotine and tobacco. It is the tobacco that is most dangerous. Not the nicotine itself" says the writer. Torbjörn Vendestad.
"It's skewed"
He is joined by Chrisoffer Morin from Borlänge:
"This is distorted. The fact that people choose a healthier alternative to consuming nicotine should not be discredited, rather the opposite. Then it is absolutely wrong that this applies to young people and children. But it would be cigarettes otherwise. Keep in mind that cigarette smoking has actually decreased, which promotes public health, both for users and those who were previously in the vicinity of smokers," writes Christian Morin on SVT's Facebook page.
"Get tougher on illegal trade"
Many people also reacted to the fact that the young people featured in the programme openly told them that they could buy e-cigarettes directly from sellers on Instagram.
"You hear young people talking about how the big problem is the illegal trade. Real shops have websites for sales and do not sell via Instagram. It's the illegal trade that needs to be tackled more vigorously if you want to make a difference with young people," writes Therese Ström, road user from Vara and active in the user organisation NNA Sweden.
Speaking out about the tastes of the elderly
Therese Ström also reacted that a representative of Region Västerbotten does not believe that "Nils, 79" likes flavours such as raspberries and cotton candy in their e-cigarette.
"Now I'm approaching 40 and I'm not Nils, but in my opinion, regular cigarettes are better than the tobacco flavours in e-cigs. Because the tobacco flavours don't taste like cigarettes. I think you should be very careful when making statements about older people, and let them have their own voice in what flavours they prefer when they quit smoking," he writes. Therese Ström.
Much better that young people vape or snuff at a party than that they smoke cigarettes, snort cocaine or buy some synthetic cannabis derivative online. I don't really understand this moral panic.
Therese is absolutely right.
For me, the tasty flavours in vejp very quickly became a barrier that made regular smoking impossible. Ignorant people think that tobacco flavour means that it tastes like tobacco smoke and this is wrong. Burnt flavours do not pass through the wrapper, so tobacco flavour is more like tea brewed from tobacco.
You have to be careful about lumping everyone together, like Nils representing all older people when he says that HE doesn't like sweets. Called age discrimination, I guess.
But let's be a little ageist for a moment and ask ourselves who is actually buying all the Punch and sweet cherry varieties on the system and who is emptying the shop shelves of Brix mix?
Not young people in any case. I'm sure Nils has his fist pretty far down in the candy jar, on Friday night.
I quit smoking over ten years ago and have not smoked a single cigarette since. Could do it very easily because of snus. Have now switched completely to nicotine portions. Without snus and portions, I would still be smoking, I'm sure. I am a man of almost 50 years old who alternates between mint and citrus but likes to try sweet fruit flavours, cola, coffee etc. My favourite is ginger.
Not a comment on vejp but we all have different preferences.