MEPs vote against medicinal regulation of electronic cigarettes

Manufacturers and users of e-cigarettes have today welcomed the news that MEPs have voted by a significant majority against measures that would have seen electronic cigarettes brought under the scope of medicinal regulation. 

Medicinal regulation, as the Parliament’s own Legal Affairs Committee and the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MRHA) have made clear, would have resulted in all currently available electronic cigarettes being taken off the market in 2016.  Instead MEPs have voted in favour of regulating electronic cigarettes broadly along the same lines as tobacco products.  As a result, MEPs have made clear that they would like to see electronic cigarettes continue to be as freely available as tobacco cigarettes.

Only electronic cigarettes that are presented as having properties for treating or preventing disease will need to be regulated as medicinal products.

Today MEPs also voted for the continued use of flavourings within e-cigarettes, which is important, as the key health benefit of e-cigarettes is determined by how many smokers switch to them or use them as a staging post to quitting completely.  This means that e-cigarettes have to be an attractive alternative to cigarettes for established smokers.  Flavourings and a wide choice of products is an important part of this.

Speaking after the vote, Fraser Cropper, chief executive officer of Totally Wicked, said: “I am delighted that MEPs have listened to the voices of millions of e-cigarette users and public health professionals across the EU, who have been campaigning tirelessly over many months to ensure that sanity prevailed.

"For 12 million people in the EU, e-cigarettes have and continue to provide a viable alternative to smoking tobacco cigarettes.  They have enabled those using them to leave smoking behind, either on a full or part-time basis.  These people are now smoking far fewer or no cigarettes.  This should be a cause for celebration, not a cause for concern.  E-cigarettes have the potential to be one of the great transformational products of the 21^st century.  By allowing the maturity of the industry within a strong regulatory framework, which supports appropriate controls and safety requirements, and its necessary social responsibility, is a mandate that is entirely appropriate and one which Totally Wicked endorses fully.

"By voting against the medicinal regulation and defining a practicable yet robust general consumer product regulatory framework, electronic cigarettes now have the deserved opportunity to contribute fully to supporting smokers’ choices beyond the current Quit-Die Paradigm.”

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