Both sides of the vaping debate in Canada say the government must do more to impose penalties on the sale of e-cigarettes to children after a review concluded there was no need to change the legislation.

The Tobacco and Vaping Products Act aims to narrow the boundaries, provide smokers with safer alternatives to combustible tobacco products, and protect youth and non-smokers from vaping.

The bill, which went into effect in 2018, legalizes the sale of e-cigarettes with or without nicotine. They are now available in vape specialty stores, convenience stores, gas stations and online retailers across the country.

After reviewing feedback from provinces and territories, NGOs, members of the vaping industry and the public, Health Canada recently decided that no amendments to the law were necessary.

Its comments said the government could use regulations to set the rules for the industry, such as the proposed regulation to limit the sale of flavored products.

But enforcement tools against violators may be limited, beyond issuing warnings, the review said. It recommends that Ottawa explore other options.

"Given the evidence of repeated violations and the limitations of warning letters, the development of additional tools to address repeated non-compliance with the progressive enforcement approach could be explored," Health Canada said in the report.

The report was presented to Parliament for consideration in December 2018.

Online sales to minors have proven particularly difficult to police because rules around age verification can be less responsive, the report said.

A 2021 Health Canada review of vaping and tobacco activity came to similar conclusions, finding specialty vaping shops to be particularly vulnerable to breaking the rules.

Cynthia Callard, executive director of the Canadian Association of Tobacco-Free Doctors, said the bill already includes fines and penalties for violations, but they haven't been taken advantage of.

“They empowered themselves when they passed the law in 2018,” Callard said in an interview. "Now they're saying, well, we've got to look at something else, without really detailing why they're not willing to use the power they have."

Health Canada did not immediately respond to a request for comment, but its report shows that it inspected more than 3,000 specialty vaping, gas stations and convenience stores in 2019 and seized more than 80,000 non-compliant vaping products.

During the pandemic, Health Canada conducted online checks and focused on promoting vaping and nicotine products. It issued warning letters to 53 of the 304 retailers it inspected for illegal social media posts.

The review made no mention of criminal charges under the bill, which would carry hefty fines or even jail time for offenders.

Rights4Vapers spokeswoman Maria Papaioannoy agreed that it would help if Health Canada focused on enforcement, especially on the sale of e-cigarettes to minors.

"We don't think a responsible vape store owner will sell to minors. We don't think a responsible convenience store owner will sell vapes to minors," said Papaioannoy, whose organization advocates for people who use e-cigarettes to quit smoking. .

The government says there isn't much research on the long-term health effects of vaping and the potential consequences of exposure to secondhand smoke, but Health Canada does tout e-cigarettes as a safer alternative to vaping combustible tobacco products.

Papaioannoy said she was pleased to see the department admit in the review that it did a poor job of encouraging smokers to switch to vaping.

Data from the government's 2021 Tobacco and Nicotine Survey found that about 5 per cent of Canadians over the age of 20 use vaping products, most of whom are smokers or former smokers.

Of those people, about half said they vaped to quit or cut down on smoking.

Teenage e-cigarette use began to increase after the legalization of e-cigarettes, but appears to have plateaued in 2021, with about 13 percent of 15- to 19-year-olds having used e-cigarettes at least once in the past 30 days, the survey showed.

The December review was the first to assess the impact of federal vaping legislation, but it did not address changes the bill made to regulation of tobacco products. Health Canada aims to review other aspects of the law within two years.

According to the timeline set out in the legislation, the report should have been submitted by May of last year, Callard said.

Doctors Tobacco Free Canada sought a federal court order in November to force the government to review, but the government released it before the matter could take place. Ottawa has yet to respond to the motion notice.

Callard said she doesn't want to spend resources pushing the issue in court, but she believes the lax approach to the timetable reflects the administration's general enforcement of the rules.

"They themselves don't take the law seriously," she said.

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