As a follow up note about e cigarettes. OCF would be an advocate for their use as a harm reduction strategy IF most of the cartridges were not coming out of China. You know the country that put melamine in dog treats that they were exporting to the US (and in milk products for human consumption in their own country) to falsely boost the measurement of protein, while killing tons of our pets here that ate them.

So there is no certification of the replaceable parts of the e cigarettes, and no regulation. The amount of nicotine in them may or may not be what is represented, and whether or not there are any contaminants in them that might be harmful is a complete unknown. If someone would get their product certified and batch tested by a credible source (we don't have to get the FDA involved in all this) OCF would recommend this as a tobacco cessation stepping tool.

People would still be addicted to Nicotine if they didn't reduce their levels. But at the end of the day, tobacco and its carcinogens would not be the delivery vehicle to get the nicotine fix. Nicotine is not without some issues, it does increase blood pressure. And extremists in the anti tobacco campaigns that want "all or nothing" will always mention that it is a poison used in insecticides.
But everything in life can pretty much be harmful to you if you do not consider volume of exposure and duration of exposure. So as someone who is a harm reduction advocate and not interested in absolutes or prohibition, which are positions that seldom work, I find nicotine to be an acceptable risk all things considered.