Home › Latest News › Vapers Digest 28th April

Vapers Digest 28th April

Kevin CrowleyPosted on Posted in Latest News

Monday’s News at a glance:

Expert Reaction to Stall in Vaping Rates ~ Hong Kong seeks to ban e-cigarettes in public in April 2026 ~ Malaysia’s Vape Policy Putting Public Health At Risk ~ Port: House blocks ‘gift’ to big tobacco’s vaping interests ~ Weaponised academia ~ New Nicotine Alliance condemns uncorrected false information about our organisation ~ A full guide to vape aerosols. Post 5: metals ~ I think I finally get what it means! ~ Four Pieces of Misinformation From a Popular X Thread about ZYN ~ Finland’s New Nicotine Pouch Rules: A Step Forward or a Step Back? ~ Prohibition Is Killing Remote Communities — It’s Time to Embrace Harm Reduction ~ Free vape kits boost quit rate among smokers, report finds ~ FIVE YEARS?! Pouch users in France could face jail time under new law ~ Conservatives to end pharmacy only rule for nicotine pouches, ‘freedom of choice’ ~ BAT to stop selling vape products from 3Q25 ~ Ep. 15 – The Pragmatic Approach to Harm Reduction with Clive Bates

Expert Reaction to Stall in Vaping Rates

Dave Cross, Planet of the Vapes

Experts have responded to the news that the rates of switching and vaping in Great Britain has stalled due to the government banning disposable/single use vape products. The study, published in the journal Addiction, was conducted by researchers at University College London using data obtains from the Smoking Toolkit Study.

Hong Kong seeks to ban e-cigarettes in public in April 2026

Kelly Ho, HKFP

The Hong Kong government is seeking to ban the possession of e-cigarettes and other alternative smoking products in public by the end of April next year, along with other proposed measures to curb smoking in the city.

Anyone who possesses small amounts of alternative smoking products in public may face a fixed fine of HK$3,000 starting on April 30, 2026, as announced by the government in the Tobacco Control Legislation (Amendment) Bill 2025 published on Friday.

Malaysia’s Vape Policy Putting Public Health At Risk

Coalition of Asia Pacific Tobacco Harm Reduction Advocates (CAPHRA), Scoop

The Coalition of Asia Pacific Tobacco Harm Reduction Advocates (CAPHRA) today urged Malaysian authorities to reject counterproductive bans on vaping and adopt risk-proportionate regulations, citing the World Health Organization’s (WHO) persistent neglect of harm reduction strategies as a key driver of preventable smoking-related deaths.

The call comes as Malaysia faces pressure to tighten vaping controls under the Control of Smoking Products for Public Health Act 2024 (Act 852), with state-level bans and stricter nicotine limits threatening progress. CAPHRA warns such measures risk replicating failed prohibition in Bhutan and South Africa, where bans fuelled illicit markets and health risks.

Port: Houfse blocks ‘gift’ to big tobacco’s vaping interests

Rob Port, Inforum

An amendment added to House Bill 1003 in February would have allowed for sale in North Dakota only vaping products that have been marketed in the United States before Aug. 8, 2016, and filed for approval by the federal Food and Drug Administration before Sept. 9, 2020.

This was described during a floor debate today as a “gift” to big tobacco, and that certainly seems accurate. Were that language to make it into law, a vast swatch of the vaping products sold in North Dakota would have become illegal, because those oddly specific dates encompass mostly vaping products sold by tobacco industry giants like Altria, R.J. Reynolds and Philip Morris.

Weaponised academia

Christopher Snowdon, The Snowdon Substack

A paper I wrote titled The Corporate Playbook: A Self-Serving Mythwas published yesterday. There is a surprisingly large literature from ‘public health’ academics looking at the political strategies of industries they disapprove of (which is nearly all of them these days). The main conclusion of my paper is that the strategies and ‘tactics’ that supposedly constitute the corporate or tobacco playbook are bog standard public affairs techniques that everybody who engages in the policy-making process uses, not least ‘public health’ groups themselves.

New Nicotine Alliance condemns uncorrected false information about our organisation

New Nicotine Alliance

In late January, a research paper was published by authors from The Truth Initiative and the University of Chicago which contained wholly false allegations about the New Nicotine Alliance. We have contacted the publishing journal, Sage Journals, on several occasions yet these fictitious claims have still not been corrected. We are writing this article to put on public record that the claims by the study’s authors are fundamentally untrue, and that the process to correct them has been unduly slow.

We first contacted Sage Journals on 21 February, writing the following letter to alert them to the false statements which had been published on their pages.

NNA_Banner_Support_Trans

A full guide to vape aerosols. Post 5: metals

Roberto Sussman, Roberto’s Substack

This is the fifth Substack post of a series of posts describing vaping aerosols, their properties, their optimal regime of operation and comparisons with tobacco smoke and other aerosols. Understanding how vape aerosols form, operate and can be tested provides the knowledge to understand their pleasurable usage, their toxicity profile and relative safety with respect to tobacco smoke and other aerosols and pollutants. Without being “experts” this knowledge reassures our confidence on the role of vapes in harm reduction and serves us to counter ignorant and malicious disinformation.

I think I finally get what it means!

Skip Murray, Skip’s Corner, Let’s Talk!

At one time, I thought what I wanted to do in the nicotine space was to help build bridges. However, after watching opposing sides hammer away at each other, I began to believe a bridge is not what was needed, because each side was trying to drag people to their side of the bridge. It made me realize that taking sides isn’t what would help save lives.

After spending last week at ATNF, I realized that is not what bridges between people are for. Bridges are a way to connect people to information and each other. It was witnessing connections being made that made me finally understand what it means to build a bridge.

Prohibition Is Killing Remote Communities — It’s Time to Embrace Harm Reduction

09algor, Australia, Let’s Improve Vaping Education (A.L.I.V.E.)

“They Just Want to Quit — But We’re Giving Them Nothing That Works”

Why Australia’s remote Indigenous communities urgently need access to safer alternatives like vaping

Tjuntjuntjara is one of the most remote communities in Australia, 1,300 kilometres from Perth, tucked into the vast Great Victoria Desert. But for all its isolation, it is now at the centre of a public health scandal that should shame us all.

A recent report by the ABC has exposed the crisis: around 70% of adults in Tjuntjuntjara smoke daily — nearly eight times the national average. The local shop charges $114 for a 30g pouch of tobacco. A single pack of 20 cigarettes costs $56. A deadly luxury tax on people with some of the lowest incomes in the country.

Two From Clearing The Air

Free vape kits boost quit rate among smokers, report finds

Ali Anderson

A UK scheme to hand out free vapes to smokers has boosted the number who successfully quit, a new report has found. 

The rate of people giving up smoking has risen from 64 per cent to 75 per cent after the kits were offered in Calderdale, Yorkshire, during a trial funded by Yorkshire Cancer Research.

Paul Lambert, Head of Services at Yorkshire Cancer Research said: “Evidence shows that vaping products are an effective method of supporting people to stop smoking, and the results from our programme in Calderdale clearly demonstrate that they have a crucial role to play in reducing smoking rates.

FIVE YEARS?! Pouch users in France could face jail time under new law

Alastair Cohen

Nicotine pouch users in France could face jail time and six figure fines under a new law currently being reviewed by the European Commission.

Under the new law, which would apply later this year, personal possession and use of nicotine pouches would be banned across the country; as would transporting pouches through the country in a clear breach of EU law on the free movement of goods. Anyone caught with them could face a jail term of five years, according to the French Public Health Code; on the basis that they are “venomous substances”.

The penalty for using narcotic drugs, like cocaine and heroin, is a maximum of one year in prison.

Conservatives to end pharmacy only rule for nicotine pouches, ‘freedom of choice’

Christopher Oldcorn, Western Standard

A Conservative government would let smokers buy nicotine pouches at corner stores and gas stations, scrapping the Liberal pharmacy only rule.

“Conservatives believe adult Canadians should have freedom of choice when it comes to what legal products they use, including vapes and nicotine pouches,” a party spokesperson told the Western Standard.

“It is also important that those trying to quit smoking should continue to have access to less harmful alternatives that have worked for them.”

BAT to stop selling vape products from 3Q25

The Star

 British American Tobacco (BAT) has announced that it will be transitioning out its current range of VUSE products of electronic cigarettes from the Malaysian market in compliance with the Control of Smoking Products for Public Health Act 2024 (Act 852) and its regulations.

In a filing with Bursa Malaysia, BAT said in order to comply with the new regulatory requirements for vapour products as set out in Act 852 and its regulations that will take effect on Oct 1, 2025, the company will be transitioning out its current range of VUSE products in the third quarter of 2025.

VSML South Africa

In this fiery episode, we sit down with Clive Bates – a global heavyweight in the harm reduction space – to unpack the politics, science, and spin behind safer nicotine alternatives.

A look back at how things have moved on or otherwise…

Vaping Increases Globally

Dave Cross, Planet of the Vapes

A week after the UK Government announced its Swap to Stop scheme, which will see one million smokers given a free vaping starter kit to help them quit smoking, the latest research from the Global State of Tobacco Harm Reduction (GSTHR) shows a significant rise in the global number of people who vape.

Vapes are a healthier option

Mary Glindon MP

It’s a big issue for the individual and for society as a whole, not least the NHS. I am not a smoker, but know why people take it up and how many want to quit but cannot.

I have been working with MPs across the political spectrum to highlight the benefits that vapes offer smokers.

Visit Nicotine Science & Policy for more News from around the World

NSP-DG

innco-02

Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Skip to toolbar