Policy by Echo Chamber: A Critical Look at Becky Freeman’s Role in Shaping Vaping Regulation
- 09algor
- 2 days ago
- 3 min read
Alan Gor 14 April 2025
The Sax Institute’s interview - 28 May 2024 - with Associate Professor Becky Freeman offers a glimpse into the machinery behind Australia’s vaping policy — one that raises more red flags than reassurances.
1. “Research” as Pretext for Policy
Freeman admits early on that her vaping research was conducted with a specific policy agenda in mind. “100%. To me, that’s the main impetus for doing this research,” she says. This isn’t an unbiased search for truth; it’s confirmation bias wrapped in public health rhetoric. The framing is: we already know what the policy should be — now, let’s gather data to justify it. That’s not science. That’s advocacy masquerading as evidence.
2. The Generation Vape Campaign: Funded Bias
Freeman proudly touts that Generation Vape was “100% backed by the Cancer Council.” But this kind of institutional endorsement is precisely the problem. When the same tightly knit circle of NGOs, government agencies, and researchers fund, conduct, interpret, and publicise the research, it creates an echo chamber. There’s no independence, no peer challenge, no external scrutiny — just coordinated message control.
3. A Researcher in Lockstep with Policymakers
Far from being a neutral observer, Freeman boasts of her embedded role with policymakers and NGOs:
“We can’t really separate out academia, NGOs, policymakers, and politicians… There’s so much crossover.”
She paints this as a strength. It should be a red flag. When academic institutions blur into government, the result is policy-led data rather than data-led policy. Independence dies, and with it, credibility.
4. Dismissing Opposing Voices and Stakeholders
Freeman bluntly says:
“There’s nothing to be gained from trying to have an honest conversation” with the vaping or tobacco industry.
That blanket dismissal includes independent vape businesses, harm reduction advocates, and millions of ex-smokers. She makes no distinction between multinational tobacco firms and small businesses helping adults quit smoking. It’s guilt-by-association, not evidence-based policymaking.
5. Contempt for Consumers and the Public
What’s completely missing from Freeman’s narrative? Consumers. Adults who vape to avoid smoking are invisible — unless they become a convenient statistic or a target of moral panic. When surveys show widespread dissatisfaction with the pharmacy model, she and her allies don’t engage — they mock, dismiss, or ignore them.
The lived experience of vapers — especially those who failed by traditional quit methods — has been systematically excluded.
Their voices are collected here:
A must-read compilation of real submissions and quotes from Australians living with the consequences of prohibitionist policy.
6. A Self-Congratulatory Media Tour
Freeman celebrates being quoted in Parliament and amplified by the media. But her pride is not in improving health outcomes — it’s in attention and influence. This is the language of a campaigner, not a scientist. Media impact is not a proxy for truth, and politics should not be a validation for research quality.
7. Political Science, Not Public Health
Freeman has been highly effective at what she set out to do: align with influential NGOs, embed herself with policymakers, and shape national policy. But this success comes at the expense of transparency, independence, and the inclusion of alternative perspectives.
Public health deserves better than a closed circle of career activists pushing prohibitionist agendas under the guise of science. It demands open debate, diverse expertise, and respect for those affected by policy decisions.
Right now, Australia’s approach to vaping reflects a system where policy is created in an echo chamber and that echo is deafening.