Social Minister: E-cigarettes Won''t Disappear from Stores in Estonia

Source from:  The Baltic Course  10/11/2013

Estonian social minister Taavi Rõivas said, commenting upon the new tobacco directive of the European Parliament that e-cigarettes wont disppear from over-the-counter market in Estonia, LETA/Postimees Online reports.

The European Parliament supported yesterday a new tobacco directive draft that aims to reduce attractiveness of tobacco among young people. One of the proposals that the MPs didn't support was to define e-cigarettes as medical products which would have meant that they could only be sold in pharmacies.

"We are of the same opinion that not all e–cigarettes have to be defined as medical devices," said Rõivas, explaining that Estonia as well as some other states want a firm limit to be set on the nicotine level in e-cigarettes, so that higher nicotine level e-cigarettes would be sold in pharmacies and e-cigarettes with low-level or no nicotine would continue to be sold at the over-the-counter market. "We have no plan to remove e-cigarettes from sale altogether," the minister said.

Estonian authorities are also compiling a bill that should regulate the e–cigarette market. The main aim of regulating the Estonian domestic e-cigarette market is to state clearly that it is banned for children to buy e-cigarettes and sell e-cigarettes to them, said Rõivas. Current Estonian laws forbid selling e-cigarettes to children already but many retailers don't adhere to that rule, making them accessible to minors. There is no clear ban yet on smoking e-cigarettes by minors.

Rõivas said that sadly, Estonian advertising has started to claim that e-cigarettes are safe and completely harmless, which contradicts studies and this also has to be regulated by the law.

The minister said that the rather soft approach of the European Parliament was a bit of a disappointment but the approval of the bill is not final as the parliament and health ministers of states can still discuss it further. Enditem