Vapers Digest 16th October
Friday’s News at a glance:
Welsh Warnings ~ CAPHRA Welcomes Oz Proposal ~ LGA Wants More Vape Restrictions ~ Strict Rules Keep Smokers Smoking ~ THR Doesn’t Need Nicotine to Be Innocent ~ A Turning Point for Vaping and Smoking Cessation ~ Twelve days apart, MEPs contradict themselves on nicotine ~ Sweden’s political deadlock leaves EU nicotine tax plans in limbo ~ EU Tobacco Consultation: Citizens Have Spoken ~ Irish Budget Vape Tax Rises: When Will The Government Learn? ~ Eight EU Ministers Call for Tougher Nicotine Restrictions. Is Europe Overlooking Sweden’s Success? ~ Counterpoint: A New Generation of the Same Old Mistake ~ #SRNT 15 past + 24 present = Progress ~ TPSAC News ~ FDA Seeks Nominations for the Tobacco Products Scientific Advisory ~ Committee; Announces New Members ~ FDA Names Four New Voting Members to Its Tobacco Advisory Committee ~ TPD: Results of the Public Consultation on the Directive’s Revision ~ Cochrane Review Concludes Vapes Help Smokers Quit, but Malaysia Faces Difficult Regulatory Choice ~ Why some experts are recommending vapes to quit smoking ~ Opinion: Ottawa needs to stop fuelling the underground nicotine market ~ Will Pennsylvania’s Vape Ban Create More Cigarette Smokers? ~ Why have vape shops taken over Ukrainian cities when 93% of e-cigarette market operates in shadows? ~ Latest UK ONS Data: Vaping Rate Edges Down to 9.9% in 2025, a Year After Overtaking Cigarette Smoking ~ Latest UK ONS Data: 54% of Vapers Are Former Cigarette Smokers, 26% Also Smoke and 20% Never Smoked Regularly
Four From Dave Cross, Planet Of The Vapes
Welsh Warnings
ASH Wales say a new report highlights public confusion as to the relative harm of vaping and that the Government needs to invest in producing clear information. The report finds that more than half of Welsh adults who have heard of vapes wrongly believe vaping is as harmful as smoking or worse.
CAPHRA Welcomes Oz Proposal
A new proposal in Australia’s federal politics would legalise and regulate vapes and nicotine pouches for adults, ending prescription, and the Coalition of Asia Pacific Tobacco Harm Reduction Advocates (CAPHRA) says it welcomes it. The group warns that the same plan also proposes to cut cigarette tax by 80%, and CAPHRA believes this conflates two different problems.
LGA Wants More Vape Restrictions
The Local Government Association (LGA) is demanding that the Government “shuts vape loop-holes and child appeal flavour tricks”…and gives it more money. It says that the Government needs to write new vape and tobacco rules so tightly that companies cannot find loopholes to keep appealing to children. The LGA adds that it fully supports restricting vaping and nicotine product in-store displays, extending plain packaging to vape products, and severely restricting vape product flavour descriptions.
Strict Rules Keep Smokers Smoking
Strict regulations on safer nicotine alternatives are hindering Kazakhstan’s fight against deadly cigarettes, according to a new report by international health experts. Smoke Free Sweden’s latest Tale of Two Nations report compares Kazakhstan’s tobacco control policies with those of Sweden, where adoption of safer alternatives has powered progress towards official smoke-free status.
FDA Seeks Nominations for the Tobacco Products Scientific Advisory Committee; Announces New Members
U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA)
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is requesting nominations by December 14, 2026, for voting members to serve on the Tobacco Products Scientific Advisory Committee (TPSAC). Individuals may self-nominate or be nominated by any interested person or organization.
Cochrane Review Concludes Vapes Help Smokers Quit, but Malaysia Faces Difficult Regulatory Choice
Newswav
Nicotine e-cigarettes can help adults stop smoking more successfully than nicotine patches, gum and other conventional nicotine replacement treatments, according to a major international evidence review.
The findings come as Malaysia weighs tighter action on vaping, including the possibility of a phased nationwide prohibition.
Three From Clearing The Air
Ireland to increase vape tax by 40 per cent from January
The increase, announced in the Budget 2027, will take excise duty from 50 cents to 70 cents per millilitre on 1 January 2027. It applies to all taxable e-liquids, including those containing no nicotine.
The announcement comes less than a year after Ireland introduced its E-liquid Products Tax on 1 November 2025. The levy covers liquids used in refillable devices as well as pre-filled products.
New Zealand smokers turn to nicotine pouches despite sales ban
Reported current use increased from 1 per cent in 2025 to 14 per cent in 2026, while awareness rose from 22 per cent to 37 per cent, according to research published by the Public Health Communication Centre on 7 October.
The findings come as the government considers allowing nicotine pouches to be sold over the counter.
INVESTIGATION: Who’s behind the anti-nicotine propaganda?
I’ve taken to trolling the Smoke Free Partnership – the flagship anti-nicotine NGO in Brussels – on LinkedIn recently. Mainly for fun, but one recent post of theirs got me thinking.
Their Director, Erin Roman, contributed to a piece calling for far tougher restrictions on safer nicotine products alongside the European Network on Smoking Prevention’s Charis Girvalki. Girvalki, you may remember, authored most of the scientific dossier supporting Palau’s extraordinary bid for a UN classification under the same UN convention that controls drugs like methamphetamine.
On this day…2015!
