Unified Industry Position Statement?

[doodlebug]

Hi, all,

We have been working with a number of colleagues outside our membership to put together a unified industry position to present to the MEPs. It is our hope that this may strengthen the case, when the politicos can see that the position of the industry is clarified in this way.

The wording is below, and I really hope that you will find that you too can agree to it, and that you will want to pass it on to any and all of your colleagues, so that as many vendors as possible can send this to their MEPs:

"We believe the following guiding principles should be the basis of any future regulatory framework for electronic cigarettes:

a. Electronic cigarettes shall not carry any claims that they are a smoking cessation aid unless they have authorisation to do so under the relevant legislation.

b. All electronic cigarette products must comply with all relevant EU consumer protection, safety and other relevant legislation; electronic cigarette products that do not make medicinal claims are not medicinal products (nor are they tobacco products); we acknowledge the need for proportionate regulation of the quality and safety of electronic cigarettes that allows them to compete with traditional cigarettes; and the Commission should be asked to consider the need for and if appropriate propose further specific and proportionate legislation.

c. All electronic cigarette products shall carry a health message regarding the addictive nature of nicotine and the sale of electronic cigarettes shall be restricted to adults and/or those over the legal age for smoking.

These principles are supported by [insert names of electronic cigarette suppliers and their trade associations].

We support amendments to the EU revised Tobacco Products Directive guided by these principles."

Ultimately, we hope to get a version circulated as widely as possible, and get everyone to literally 'sign on the line', ready for presentation to all members of ENVI, JURI, IMCO, the Commission, the Council and others. If you would like to be involved in this way, please email me at [e-mail]. Thank you.

All the best,

Katherine

[Jemima]

Anything to be included about the nicotine levels ?

[OneDay]

I'm sorry but to me this reads like a total cop-out. It lists all the 'bad' things about vaping and none of the good. Of course vaping is a cessation aid - just read how many forum members have given up completely after years of trying. The message I get from these paragraphs is "please legislate the shit out of us and we will roll over and take whatever you give us"

[doodlebug]

Jemima: it seems more likely that this will be booted back to the Commission in its entirety, since the JURI opinion, but we have already put forward our suggestion of 5% as a more appropriate limit. We'll just have to wait and see on that one....

OneDay: I am sorry if that is your reading of it. The fundamental problem is that if they can demonstrate that electronic cigarettes are sold as smoking cessation aids, they automatically become medicinal products, at which point they would legislate the s*** out of us, and we couldn't even take them to court and win in that instance! Fortunately, since they are NOT sold as medicines, we are on legally solid ground - hence the JURI opinion.

Cheers,

Katherine

[Deleted]

Oneday I disagree , the act of inhaling from an electronic cigarette is simply replicating the act of smoking and is therefore not an aid to cessation of nicotine .

[OneDay]

@storm the wording doesn't say nicotine cessation, it says smoking cessation

[Deleted]

IMO when vaping you are still smoking , but we all have our own opinion !

[Jemima]

May 6, 2013 22:14:50 GMT doodlebug said:

Jemima: it seems more likely that this will be booted back to the Commission in its entirety, since the JURI opinion, but we have already put forward our suggestion of 5% as a more appropriate limit. We'll just have to wait and see on that one....

Cheers,

Katherine

Ah ok just had a little panic lol thanks for getting back to me

[lordbarby]

Sorry ECITA your giving too much away. C Cigs should be OUT of the Directive. Hopefully JURI will ratify the draft opinion, which says just thay

[monty]

I don't know if "Electronic cigarettes shall not carry any claims that they are a smoking cessation aid unless they have authorisation to do so under the relevant legislation." is to ward off big P. But there are many of us who quit smoking quickly and comparatively easily with ecigs after failing with everything else. In particular the temptation to smoke is so small. I think it is best to be honest and say vaping enables many to stop smoking even if it doesn't halt the nicotine habit.

When the full facts are out I expect it will emerge that for more than half of smokers ecigs are the surest cessation option.

Good luck and thanks for all your hard work.

[lobeydosser]

May 6, 2013 21:33:41 GMT OneDay said:

I'm sorry but to me this reads like a total cop-out. It lists all the 'bad' things about vaping and none of the good. Of course vaping is a cessation aid - just read how many forum members have given up completely after years of trying. The message I get from these paragraphs is "please legislate the shit out of us and we will roll over and take whatever you give us"

Perhaps it is a cessation aid for you and some other forum members, but I for one, and I am sure for the majority, have no intention of either cutting down or stopping vaping and indeed I can now choose what MG level I vape at and on certain days, vape a higher amount of nicotine than I ever did when I smoked.

I will continue to vape until government legislation says otherwise and hopefully only return to smoking when I an halfway up the crematorium chimney!

[Blownupdolly]

Hello Katherine. Hope you are well.

Reading through all this once again raises the argument as to what vaping actually is, and what we officially classify ourselves as.
Until we ourselves put this one to bed and come to a decision on it, we cannot move forward and fight our corner.

1. A fair percentage do use it as a smoking cessation aid

2. In my opinion the largest percentage use it as an ALTERNATIVE to smoking. That being the operative word because, as we know, no smoke is involved.Using it as the alternative means we still put nicotine into our bodies and this is the whole crux of the matter.

Personally, I feel the wording e-cigarette has a lot to answer for. Non smokers, politicians and anti campaigners cannot possibly see it as anything else but bad whilst the word cigarette is in there. Note the big pharmaceuticals never ever use the word in the name of their particular methods of NRT. This terminology needs to go!

[lobeydosser]

I wholeheartedly agree with Blownupdolly.

What we use is a Electronic Vaporiser, or E-VAPE.

[Brambles]

I am sorry Katherine but your proposal is going to prove weak and ineffective. It reads and looks like it has been put together in 5 minutes and not by consultation with many others.

5% nicotine level in vaping devices is NOT enough (edited). All documents letters and proposals made need to start referring to 'E-cigarettes' with a better and more descriptive term of what they are. Note my use of the words 'vaping devices'. Any proposal for standards to apply to such devices needs to address in more detail all aspects of the device addressing quality control, nicotine max levels, max levels of impurities, battery safety, electrical safety etc.

You have to ask yourself what is the document is trying to achieve. Is it a standard for vaping devices and liquids used in them, or is it just to make a noise and result is oh yes there have been x hundred people against the current proposals but have not offered a structured and usable alternative?

ECITA is an organisation collecting monies from the members it represents. Clearly your goal is to not only represent the vendors but also their end customers and people who use Electronic cigarettes better descriptively called vaping devices. I would have expected a far better proposal that that listed in the original post. It is really quite astonishing it is such a boring and non effective proposal which no one reading will be enlightened by any of it. If you want something to be read and made use of then it must be interesting, informative but concise and very clear in its goals. I doubt my reply is any of those things, but then I am not charged with producing this response, but you are in producing effective proposals. It is far from clear what you are actually trying to achieve.

Regards, Jon.

[lobeydosser]

<<<5% nicotine level in vaping devices is NOT enough. >>>

How high are you vaping, Jon?

Like my everyday vaping is 2.4% or 24mg although I do occasionally go up to 3% or 30mg and I have even been known to do a 3.6% or 36mg.

If 5% or 50mg is not high enough for you, perhaps something administered by Syringe might be worthwhile considering!