New Delhi, March 5 (IANS)| Millions of people across Asia could be forced to smoke after the World Health Organization (WHO) passed a resolution by lawmakers on e-cigarettes and other smokeless products. Coalition of Asia Pacific Tobacco Harm Reduction Advocates (CAPHRA) said this on Friday. A new report published by the WHO’s Tobacco Regulatory Committee has recommended a ban on almost all smokeless cigarettes used with vapor or vapor, especially the so-called open system.
The open system is the preferred method of vaping for many across Asia and the consumer manually refills the liquid to be vaporized. According to WHO, this system allows the addition of substances that can make the product more harmful.
Know what CAHRA said
“The latest WHO recommendation defies all logic,” CAPHRA executive coordinator Nancy Lucas said in a statement. “If different countries adopt the recommendation to ban open-system vaping, years of hard work for ex-smokers as well as good public policy will go to waste,” he said.
“There is no doubt that vapers will start smoking cigarettes again, with the worst possible consequences,” Nancy said. “Banning any single product or imposing cigarette regulations on all emerging products is not the answer. Bans encourage black marketing. Bans don’t allow for proper consumer protection,” he said.
CAPHRA is calling on governments to adopt evidence-based, common sense regulations for all volatile products. “Last week Public Health England (PHE), the UK’s leading health agency, concluded that nicotine vaping products are the most popular means used by smokers,” Nancy said.
[प्रतिकात्मक तस्वीर (File Photo: IANS)]
“On the one hand you have a local public health agency looking at the evidence and ways in which smokers can be encouraged to quit smoking and vape, on the other you have a global agency, which is relying on its old ways of negation for the answer to everything.” Nancy termed the WHO’s approach to e-cigarettes as disastrous for millions of cigarette smokers worldwide.
CAPHRA also said that only through regulating the products can things go well and also encouraging people to stop smoking and result in good public health outcomes.