In March, the Chinese government adopted the Administrative Measures on E-cigarettes, which banned all flavoured e-cigarettes except tobacco flavour. WHO welcomes the announcement and looks forward to strong enforcement of this policy when it takes effect in May 2022.
Regulation of e-cigarettes should be part of comprehensive tobacco control strategies.
WHO recommends that, wherever manufacture, sale, and distribution of e-cigarettes is not prohibited, Member States should adopt appropriate regulatory options to achieve the key objectives of protecting the population from potential health risks; preventing
unproven claims being made about e-cigarettes; and protecting tobacco control activities from commercial interests.
E-cigarettes are harmful to users and may also cause harm to bystanders. They make the enforcement of smoke-free public places more difficult. They are particularly risky when used by children and adolescents. Exposure to nicotine to children and adolescents
can have long-lasting, damaging effects on brain development and using e-cigarettes also poses the risk of nicotine addiction. Moreover, children and adolescents who use e-cigarettes, even if experimentally, are more than twice as likely to later
use conventional cigarettes. To make their products attractive to youth, the e-cigarette industry tries to market these products as fashion symbols by using a variety of flavours, attractive packaging, and other forms and tactics of advertising and
promotion.
Stepping back, it is important to remember that the best way to protect young people goes well beyond regulating e-cigarettes and involves implementing the evidence-based tobacco control measures that China is committed to as a Party to the WHO Framework
Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC). It is important to remember that the tobacco industry never stops in trying to win new customers by making their harmful products accessible, affordable and appealing to our children.
Tobacco use remains a top risk factor for non-communicable disease in China. Article 5.2 of the WHO FCTC obliges Parties to implement effective measures aimed at preventing and reducing tobacco consumption, nicotine addiction and exposure to tobacco smoke. The government can effectively protect public health, especially the younger generation by:
- implementing higher excise taxes on all tobacco and e-cigarettes products and make certain that increases outpace inflation and income growth, so that tobacco it is not as cheap as a school lunch;
- Comprehensively banning smoking and using e-cigarettes in all indoor public places, workplaces and public transportation to protect people from toxic second-hand smoke and denormalise smoking in public places;
- requiring large and pictorial health warnings on packages of these products to effectively inform the consequences of using these products, and make the package unappealing to youth; and
- banning all forms of advertising, promotion and sponsorship of tobacco products and e-cigarettes.
When all the measures above are implemented and well enforced, our next generation can be better protected from these toxic products.