Mexico bans imports of e-cigarettes and heated tobacco products

The President of Mexico has issued a decree[1] banning the import and export of e-cigarettes and heated tobacco products to protect youth from the risk of nicotine addiction. The presidential decree, signed on February 19, is a significant step in Mexico’s tobacco control efforts to protect the next generation from nicotine and tobacco addiction. Youth e-cigarette use is a serious concern, as youth nicotine use in any form is not benign, including addictive and potentially harmful to adolescent brain development. Public health authorities must address this reality and not wait to properly regulate them[2] in order to prevent their consumption by young people or even to challenge their policies to reduce tobacco consumption. Effective policies in this area include:[3] : - to prevent the use of these products by non-smokers, particularly young people; - to prevent the existence of e-cigarettes from undermining progress in reducing tobacco consumption and nicotine dependence; - to protect public health policy from the commercial interests of the tobacco and e-cigarette industries; and - to help smokers quit smoking and avoid co-use of tobacco products and e-cigarettes. To achieve these policy objectives, health authorities should regulate e-cigarettes as therapeutic products only on the basis of reliable independent scientific evidence. This regulation should be consistent with other tobacco control provisions. For heated tobacco products, governments should consider either banning them or regulating them in the same way as traditional cigarettes, in line with their obligations under the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco ControlIn the United States, e-cigarette use has soared to epidemic levels due to the tactics of marketing companies like Juul and the use of attractive flavors like mango, mint, and bubblegum. Added to this is the use of influencers on social networks. Whether it is e-cigarettes or new tobacco products, all of these marketing tactics are directly derived from the practices of the tobacco industry, which is more generally transforming itself into nicotine industry companies. These tactics expose a whole new generation of young people to addictive products and threaten to reverse decades of progress in the fight against tobacco. ©Generation Without Tobacco

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[1] http://www.dof.gob.mx/nota_detalle.php?codigo=5586899&fecha=19/02/2020 [2] https://www.tobaccofreekids.org/assets/global/pdfs/en/Regulating_ecigs.pdf [3] https://www.tobaccofreekids.org/what-we-do/global/electronic-cigarettes ©National Committee Against Smoking |