The UK to Allow Health Claims for Vaping

An announcement by the Committees of Advertising Practice (CAP and BCAP), stated that health claims are no longer banned from ads for e-cigarettes. However, a piece on Ashtray Blog pointed out that the devices will be still be subject to several limitations, and that in actual fact the changes are quite small.

E-cig manufacturers are still unable to say that a particular range of products is safer than smoking, unless they can refer to research tied to that particular range. Additionally, the Advertising and Standards Agency (ASA) said that when an advertiser makes broad claims about vaping, it is “very likely” that these claims will be tied to a particular product.

This seems to indicate that before making any health claims about their products, manufacturers will need to commission their own studies. Furthermore, certain restrictions on nicotine-containing e-cigarettes will remain in place, as for example these may still not be advertised in a range of media including radio, newspapers and TV.

Research indicating that e-cig adverts may encourage smokers to quit

In a study conducted earlier this year, researchers from Bentley University, the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, Cornell University and the National Bureau of Economic Research, found that if e-cigarette ads had to be banned, the current smoking cessation rate in the US would drop by 3%.

The researchers had surveyed 25,000 individuals between 2013 and 2015, inquiring about their smoking status, whether they had tried quitting, the methods used and their success rates. The data collected indicated that the removal of e-cigarettes’ adverts on TV would result in about 105,000 fewer quitters.