Pressure mounts on the European Commission to tackle overdue tobacco regulations

In the absence of a firm plan to overhaul tobacco regulations this year, the European Commission is coming under pressure to revise its outdated Tobacco Excise Directive (TED).

Individual member states and lobby groups are calling  for the EU to update legislation on minimum tobacco tax levels and new and alternative products.

Following the Dutch government’s spearheading of a proposal for stricter regulations, the World Vapers’ Alliance has sent an open letter to the Commission and EU countries.

It states that the Dutch-led move “threatens to undermine years of progress in helping smokers quit through safer alternatives like vaping and nicotine pouches”.

The open letter accusing policymakers of “ignoring scientific advice and public opinion in favour of misguided, prohibitionist approaches” has been signed by more than 100,000 petitioners across Europe.

It was sparked by the Dutch health minister Vincent Karremans calling on the Commission to place “comprehensive restrictions on flavours, nicotine levels and plain packaging on e-cigarettes and other nicotine products,” according to Euractiv.

Amid the current clash, the Commission maintains its intention to tackle the long-awaited tobacco directive. The health and animal welfare minister Olivér Várhelyi has reiterated his mission commitment to evaluate and revise EU rules on tobacco and nicotine products.

In the meantime, individual states are pursuing their own policies, such as the banning of nicotine pouches. France intends to join Belgium, Germany and Luxembourg in refusing the oral product.

The backdrop to the contentious issue of tobacco legislation is Europe’s Beating Cancer Plan, a public health roadmap which aims for 0% of youth and 5% of adults to be tobacco users by 2040. 

Belgium’s own tobacco plan adheres to this plan and is behind a raft of measures, such as restricting tobacco sales, increasing tax levels and no-smoking zones in public spaces.

But the ambitious goal is misplaced and unrealistic, according to Clive Bates, the director of the UK public health and sustainability practice Counterfactual Consulting.

“If we are interested in "beating cancer" then the overwhelming priority is to reduce smoking,” says the former director of public health charity Action on Smoking and Health (ASH).

He believes that setting the target to exclude people who switch to smokeless tobacco or heated tobacco products makes the target harder to achieve. “It mean that the EU does not encourage people to use smoke-free tobacco products to quit smoking when that approach may actually work for many people.”

Bates is concerned about the move by some member states to ban or apply excessive restrictions on products likes vapes or pouches. “These products are the main reason why the 2040 target is achievable.”

He is convinced that the harm-reduction approach to alternative products is “the biggest opportunity we have to end smoking”.

In a bid to discourage the youth market, Belgium banned disposable vapes at the beginning of this year, while the UK is set to impose a similar outlaw on 1 June.

For Bates, there is a risk that the ban could backfire. “Around 2 million adults use disposable vapes in the UK. When the government did an impact assessment, it estimated that as many as 29% could revert to smoking.”

He describes the benefits of these products as “cheap, easy to use, convenient, and work well as alternatives to cigarettes.”

On a pragmatic note, he calls for a less emotional stance on youth vaping. “Some of those who take up vaping would have gone on to be smokers in a world without vaping. For them, the vaping is highly beneficial. Others may never have smoked, but they are likely to be less dependent, more experimental and transient vapers.” 

One reason for the spotlight on youth smokers is concern over vapers’ nicotine exposure. While alternative products deliver the addictive substance without the harmful chemicals that are released when a cigarette is burned, there are fears about its potential risks.

Bates believes the dangers of nicotine have been exaggerated. “There are some minor effects, but nothing remotely approaching the harms of smoking.”

He cites the lack of evidence of lasting impairments on the brain in the generations of adults who grew up as teenage smokers. “We do have to recognise that nicotine use is dependence-forming, and that is a downside,” he adds, calling for questions about why people consume it.

“There is a body of science on the role of nicotine in modulating mood and improving cognitive performance. I am not recommending it, but I think we should do more to understanding why it is popular.”

On the European Commission’s overdue directive, Bates would like to see a new TED,  which would set a minimum tax level, “but believes it should be sufficiently flexible to allow member states to use taxation to promote switching from high-risk to low-risk tobacco and nicotine products.”

It would mean high taxes on cigarettes and no taxes or low taxes on vapes, pouches, and heated tobacco, he says. ‘This structure would be consistent with major EU principles of proportionality and developing the internal market with a high level of consumer and human health protection.”

Photos: ©Belga; Goodboro e-cigarette, e-liquids & accessories store, Namur © Damien Maguire/Image Digital