Following an Oval Office meeting at the White House on Wednesday, the Trump Administration has announced plans to ban non-tobacco flavoured e-liquids throughout the US in response to the ongoing problem the US is experiencing with youth vaping and the vaping related incidents under investigation with the CDC.
The American Vaping Association
While a number of congress members have expressed their support for this decision, the American Vaping Association have stated their concern that the ban is not the best course of action, and could in fact lead those who are currently using an e-cigarette to revert back to smoking, increasing their risk of smoking related disease and illness. A spokesperson said;
"A ban will remove life-changing options from the market that have been used by several million American adults to quit smoking." - The American Vaping Association
UKVIA
UK Vaping Industry Association spokesperson Dan Marchant highlighted how e-cigarettes can play a crucial role in the fight against tobacco products, and that flavoured e-liquids can be considered necessary to this success, saying:
‘'It is a shame that the US President has been poorly advised on the facts; this decision is based on misleading information and will only serve to deter smokers from making a life changing switch to a far less harmful alternative. In the UK, we are proud to be a standard bearer for a consumer-driven industry which has already helped millions of people across the world stop smoking. We will continue to work with the public health community in the UK to spread the facts about vaping, which Public Health England continue to advise is 95% less harmful than smoking and is the most effective way for UK’s remaining 7 million smokers to quit.
Flavours play a hugely important role in encouraging smokers to switch to a less harmful product, and crucially in providing enough consumer variety to ensure those smokers stay switched. At the same time, there is no evidence of any link between flavours and youth vaping; in the UK recent stats show that rates of vaping amongst young people remains at less than 2% and is almost exclusively confined to those youths who regularly smoke.
As an Association, we want to ensure that rates of youth vaping remain very low but we are also clear that any move to ban flavours is not the way to do this. That’s why we will continue to work together as an industry to take the responsible steps necessary to prevent access to vaping by young people without deterring adult smokers from using a less harmful product. Our code of conduct insists on robust online age verification methods, a challenge 25 policy in-store and sets a clear expectation that products are only to be marketed towards adult smokers, vapers and consumers of other nicotine products." - Dan Marchant, UK Vaping Industry Association
Sources:
https://www.ukvia.co.uk/ukvia-responds-to-reported-deaths-in-the-usa-2-2/
