UK bans promotion of e-cigarettes on social networking sites

Time： 2023-04-19

social media influencers could be banned from promoting vaping to teens after a surge in the number of videos on TikTok and Instagram. British government mini...

Social media influencers may be banned from promoting vaping to teens after the number of videos on TikTok and Instagram exploded.

British government ministers are gathering evidence to understand how to stop young people from using e-cigarettes after growing concerns that young people could get hooked on nicotine through the products. A ban on fruit flavorings and packaging that may appeal to children is already being considered.

TikTok does not allow ads promoting e-cigarettes or other tobacco products on its platform, but there are growing concerns about widespread use by influencers.

Professor Andrew Bush, of the National Heart and Lung Institute at Imperial College London, has urged ministers to push for a ban on colorful and attractive e-cigarette packaging.

He also encouraged them to look at how to promote the devices on social media. Professor Bush told the Mirror it was concerning that people with huge influence over children were promoting vaping for them on social media.

“I don’t recall nicotine gum ever being in an attractive ad with a beautiful lady using it. It’s the industry that’s funding these people or so-called influencers, most likely giving them free e-cigarettes. They all know tobacco is coming and want e-cigarettes to be the next big thing,” he said.

It comes after a Mirror investigation revealed today that shops were illegally selling nicotine e-cigarettes to children.

A 13-year-old undercover shopper was able to buy a stack of e-cigarettes - with as much nicotine as 100 cigarettes - in one day.

Health Secretary Neil O'Brien said last week that the government was making a special appeal for evidence on youth vaping.

The Conservative MP said: "This will look at a range of issues, including how we ensure compliance, looking at what e-cigarettes look like and what they look like, about the marketing and promotion of e-cigarettes, and the role of social media, which is crucial. It will also seek to better understand the e-cigarette market, looking at issues such as the price of low-cost products and disposables.

Conservative MP Caroline Johnson, who is also an adviser to paediatricians, recently said ministers needed to press ahead with a massive, multi-pronged attack on youth vaping, bringing advertising rules into line with smoking rules.

“Influencers on social media are also an issue that we need to keep a close eye on – although effective regulation designed to discourage this form of marketing needs to strike the right balance,” she said.

There is worrying evidence of underage vaping, which doubled in the last year, according to ASH, who found that 7% of teens aged 11 to 17 surveyed in 2022 were "current users". , up from 3.3 percent the year before.

There are also concerns about the rise of illegal-sized black-market vaping, with the Chartered Trading Standards Institute warning that around a third of vaping products on shelves breach UK law. Illegal e-cigarettes purchased by our undercover children contained five times the nicotine content of legal e-cigarettes for twice the price.

Organized criminal gangs are believed to be smuggling £500m worth of illegal e-cigarettes into the UK every year. Most of them are made in China and are designed for larger and stronger vaping legal markets, such as the United States.

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