National Health Forum, an orgnisation working in the field of tobacco control, has requested the Centre to support Union Health Ministry’s decision to end manufacture, distribution, import and sale of e-cigarettes and ensure that such products are banned.

“...All other Ministries must support this move and ensure that such products are banned and are not included as legal products under the COTPA (Cigarettes and Other Tobacco Products Act) or the Drugs and Cosmetics Act,” said Mandakini Sinh  of National Health Forum.

“Any easing of these norms will lead to a deluge of these tobacco products which are pernicious to health.”

After a lot of thought, the Health Ministry in consultation with various NGOs had issued an advisory for states to ban e-cigarettes, e-vaps and e-hookah, Electronic Nicotine Delivery Systems (ENDS) and similar such products, said Sinh, adding thereafter, about a dozen States have banned these products including Maharashtra, Punjab, Bihar, Karnataka, Gujarat and Rajasthan.

“There is a concerned attempt by importers of E-cigarettes to ensure that the Ministry of Health’s good work done providing a platform for prohibition of imports of these products is frustrated.

To this end, it has been brought to our attention that various representations and legal challenges have been mounted by them.”

Noting that about 30 countries in the world, including various states of the US, have banned the production, import and sale of e-cigarettes, she said regulatory pressure on these products in their home markets is now compelling them to target developing economies like India.

Mentioning that claims made by the manufacturers of E-cigarettes that they are “reduced harm alternatives” are not proven by any independent scientific studies, she said what the international conventional tobacco products manufacturers are doing is to use e-cigarettes as a gateway product in luring the youth.

“The idea is to introduce the young teenage user to E-cigarettes and then graduate them to the more conventional tobacco products. Infact, from studies conducted by the WHO and several independent scientific bodies it is clear that e-cigarettes can have adverse health effects like pulmonary and cardio- vascular diseases,” Sinh said.