Australia is to ban recreational vaping as part of a wide-ranging campaign aimed at combating what experts have described as an “epidemic”.
Minimum quality standards will also be adopted, with the sale of electronic cigarettes limited to pharmacies only.
Australia already applies a requirement requiring a person to provide a medical certificate to use e-cigarettes, but the sector is subject to poor regulation in light of the boom in the black market.
Health Minister Mark Butler said the products contributed to creating a new generation of smoking addicts in Australia.
The idea of electronic cigarettes depends on heating a liquid, usually containing nicotine, and turning it into vapor that smokers inhale, and it is seen as a product aimed at helping smokers quit smoking.
However, e-cigarettes have become widespread in Australia as a recreational product, especially among young people in cities.
“Just as they did with smoking… Big Tobacco has embraced yet another addictive product, packaging it in attractive packaging and adding sweet flavors that has created a new generation of nicotine addicts,” Butler said in a speech announcing the reforms on Tuesday.
Tightening already strict rules
Australia already has some of the strictest anti-smoking laws in the world, and Butler on Tuesday compared new reforms aimed at tackling vaping, as well as those used to combat smoking in Australia, with reforms implemented in developed countries.
The reforms include a ban on all single-use e-cigarettes, and banning the import of products that do not require a prescription.
Prescriptions will be necessary for vaping products that remain legal, and they will need to be placed in pharmaceutical-like packaging, as well as restrictions on flavours, colours, concentrations of nicotine and other ingredients.
“Gum flavours, pink varieties or e-cigarettes disguised as text highlighters will no longer be available to kids that are easy to hide in their pencil case,” Butler said.
