Good news for the vaping community in New Zealand as AVCA (Aotearoa Vapers Community Advocacy), is now registered and officially recognised as a charity.
Some people will ask why a vaping organisation is a charity. In a press release announcing the move, AVCA said “This development will allow us to continue doing what we do and extend our Education, Access and Advocacy goals to the whole of New Zealand. This is what AVCA does – we educate the community and anyone interested in e-cigarettes – about what we do, why we do it and how to make the most of it to quit smoking traditional cigarettes.
Take action to help the community quit smoking.
The organization has made it clear that it has recently focused on providing free smoker education and counseling, while helping those people to switch to safe alternatives to quit smoking, AVCA is also involved in sharing information and scientific research with governments and other health professionals.
Members of the newly registered charity hope that with the new status they will be able to expand their reach, especially to those who want to share the information available, and it will also allow them a new avenue for receiving donations to fund new projects such as providing online training through seminars and holding information sessions.
Information is key. Knowledge is power. We empower people to make choices based on recent scientific information combined with the experiences of people who have successfully switched from cigarettes to e-cigarettes.
- AVCA
They aim to build a support network and make sure that people who are looking for and need an effective smoking cessation tool have access to all the necessary information about these products.
Last April, a group of scientists also from New Zealand released a study on the effectiveness of e-cigarettes as a smoking cessation tool, adding that “It is difficult to imagine that the health effects from a decade of vaping would be comparable to the effects of decades of exposure to tobacco smoke.”
Enhance your position through information sharing
Between April and October 2016, AVCA's Vape It Forward program had a 95% success rate in helping smokers switch to e-cigarettes, and they intend to maintain this success by keeping communication channels open so anyone can access the information they need.
This article was published on Vapingpost by Diane Caruana and translated by The Vape Club.
