PARIS - Governments should ban the use of electronic cigarettes indoors and in public places and tactics to lure young users, the World Health Organization said in a report released on Tuesday. It also raised concerns about the role of big tobacco companies in the fast-growing market.
Considering the numerous uncertainties surrounding e-cigarettes, which have been on the market for less than a decade, the United Nations organization said it was appropriate to prohibit their use indoors 'until exhaled vapour is proven to be not harmful to bystanders.'
It also called for regulation to ensure the products contain a standard dose of nicotine, as the drug content now varies widely between manufacturers. And to stop children from picking up the habit, it said that e-cigarette sales to minors should be banned and that fruity, candy-type flavorings should be prohibited.
The report, which summarizes the growing body of evidence on the health impact of electronic cigarettes, was prepared by the World Health Organization for the United Nations Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, to be held in mid-October in Moscow. The organization has no power to enforce its recommendations, but delegates to the meeting could, in theory, endorse the measures for inclusion in a treaty or call for yet more studies before taking further action. One wild card hanging over the meeting is the tense political standoff between Russia and the West over the crisis in Ukraine, which could hamper international cooperation.
The United Nations tobacco treaty, adopted in 2003, is designed to reduce illnesses and deaths caused by tobacco. Signatory countries promise to eliminate or limit tobacco advertising, to raise cigarette taxes and to take steps to end smoking in public places.
The organization noted in the report on Tuesday its apprehensions about Big Tobacco becoming 'increasingly aggressive in the battle for the fast-growing e-cigarette market.' It said that while the current crop of independent e-cigarette companies had 'no interest in perpetuating tobacco use, the tobacco industry involved in the production and sale of electronic nicotine delivery systems certainly is.'
The growing role of the traditional cigarette industry 'is of grave concern in light of the history of the corporations that dominate that industry,' the report said. It added that selling e-cigarettes - whose manufacturers say the products have health benefits compared with regular tobacco - 'is intended to bring reputational benefits to these companies, as they can pretend to be part of the solution to the smoking epidemic.'
The tobacco industry, it adds, as well as 'its allies and front-groups, can never be considered to be a legitimate public health partner or stakeholder while it continues to profit from tobacco and its products or represents the interests of the industry.'
Unlike conventional cigarettes, e-cigarettes employ a tiny battery-powered heating element to turn a solution of propylene glycol and nicotine into an inhalable vapor.
The rapid growth of the market for e-cigarettes has left national regulatory systems and health policy experts struggling to keep up, as old notions about the dangers of tobacco and smoking are posed in a new light. The health body said that there are now 466 brands of e-cigarette globally, in a market valued last year at $3 billion. The market research firm Euromonitor forecasts that sales will swell by a factor of 17 by 2030.
Electronic nicotine delivery systems 'are the subject of a public health dispute among bona fide tobacco-control advocates that has become more divisive as their use has increased,' the report notes. Some experts embrace them as a means of reducing the harm associated with traditional cigarettes while others view them as a threat to the progress that has been made in 'denormalizing' the use of tobacco.
Armando Peruga, a program manager for the World Health Organization's Tobacco Free Initiative who helped draft the report, said its policy experts had to balance the urgent need for more research with the need to have clear regulations today to protect public health - based on the existing knowledge.
'It's difficult to predict' when there will be a scientific consensus on the risk of e-cigarettes, he said. 'But we're not close, let's put it that way.'
He said delegates to the Moscow conference would be considering how to adjust their laws to accommodate the sharp rise in e-cigarettes, noting that in many places, 'smoking is defined as 'holding a lit tobacco product.' Well, many parties are going to say, 'This doesn't fit that definition.''
The number of young Americans who have tried electronic cigarettes but never used conventional tobacco tripled in 2013 from 2011, to more than 250,000, according to a report on Monday from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta. Youth smoking rates in the United States dropped by half from 1997 to 2011, according to federal data, but the pace of the decline has slowed in recent years. Many health advocates worry that e-cigarettes may lead teenagers to use conventional cigarettes instead of serving as an alternative to them.
'Vapers,' as e-cigarette aficionados are known, have become a potent lobby on behalf of the products. Their support helped the tobacco industry defeat a European Commission proposal that the devices be regulated in Europe as medicines. In February, the European Parliament voted to adopt a set of rules that include a ban on advertising. The tobacco industry is lobbying to water down the measures before they are to go into effect in 2016.
In the United States, the Food and Drug Administration in April proposed extending its regulation of tobacco products to include e-cigarettes, with a ban on the sale of e-cigarettes to people under 18. The proposal remains under consideration and public comment.
In the report on Tuesday, the organization said e-cigarette advertisers should be prohibited from making any health claims, including on the product's purported value as a smoking cessation aid, 'until manufacturers provide convincing supporting scientific evidence and obtain regulatory approval.'
The organization also said e-cigarettes should come with health warnings covering known risks, including 'potential nicotine addiction; potential respiratory, eyes, nose and throat irritant effect; potential adverse effect on pregnancy (due to nicotine exposure).'
Ultimately, though, the report notes that the jury is still out on many of the important health questions. Considering how new the products are, and the relatively long time it takes for some diseases, including cancer, to develop, it said, 'conclusive evidence' about the connection between those diseases and e-cigarettes use 'will not be available for years or even decades.'
Posted by Unknown on Tuesday, August 26, 2014 - Rating: 4.5
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