Not satisfied with its efforts to ban tobacco and demonize its users, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is now taking aim at a potentially healthier alternative to traditional cigarettes, electronic cigarettes.

Electronic cigarettes (or e-cigarettes) are battery powered devices that emulate the look and feel of traditional cigarettes and deliver a vaporized nicotine solution directly to the lungs when smoked. The devices contain no tobacco and there is no combustion involved in their operation.

They also contain far fewer carcinogens than other tobacco products, which may make them an excellent alternative to products like cigarettes, cigars and pipes.

Despite their potential, the federal government is not thrilled with the devices. The FDA has already halted 50 shipments of e-cigarettes at ports and borders around the country and some elected officials have suggested that these devices be removed from store shelves until their safety can be guaranteed by the FDA, who claimed in a recently released study that e-cigarettes contain cancer-causing chemicals such as diethylene glycol and some nitrosamines. Most media outlets have followed suite by warning of the dangers posed by e-cigarettes.

What nobody seems interested in reporting about the study, however, is its conclusion—which hardly warrants the critical reception e-cigarettes have received thus far. According to the EPA’s own report, both brands of e-cigarettes they tested contained “tobacco specific nitrosamines and tobacco specific impurities […] at very low levels,” and of the 18 nicotine cartridges that were tested, only one contained diethylene glycol, and only at 1 percent.

It’s also worth noting that the same chemicals the FDA warns are present in e-cigarettes are also present in many of the nicotine replacement therapies the FDA approves of. What’s more, absolutely zero deaths have been attributed to e-cigarettes since their introduction. The same is also true of instances of lung cancer.

So what justification is there for distorting the evidence and deceiving the public about a product that has the potential to save lives? There isn’t any. This is nothing more than scare mongering on the part of the opportunistic health nannies at the FDA and their shills in the media.