The government of Taiwan has been consulting on amendment its Tobacco Hazards Prevention and Control Act. Article 14 of the amendment bill bans the manufacture, import, sale, and display of e-cigarettes (unless authorised as a pharmaceutical product). See newspaper coverage. The original Taiwan Chinese language bill is available online and a vendor has produced a summary in English.
See my full response here (PDF) and the summary below
Obviously, I strongly advise against this measure. E-cigarettes present an important strategy to reduce the harm caused by smoking and offer a way to achieve rapid reductions in smoking through market-based means. There is no evidence anywhere in the world that e-cigarettes add to harms associated with smoking.
The danger of a prohibition of e-cigarettes is that it will protect the cigarette trade from competition, increase smoking and harm health. This is exactly the opposite of what the Act and the government are trying to achieve. The summary page is below. Continue reading “Challenging the proposed e-cigarette prohibition in Taiwan”
A recent editorial in the journal Tobacco Control discusses what’s wrong with the FDA. In fact, the editorial is more telling about what’s wrong with tobacco control.