On 3 February 2021, the long-awaited Eurobarometer report was published. Titled “Attitudes of Europeans towards tobacco and electronic cigarettes,” the survey examined European citizen's relationship with tobacco and related products. Fieldwork was conducted between August 2020 and September 2020 and involved interviews with 28,228 people from 27 EU member states and the UK. Data from the previous Eurobarometer report in 2017 is also made available for comparison. It is an extensive report, 334 pages long, with separate factsheets available for each member state plus the UK. A 54-page summary of the main points is also available. The importance of the Eurobarometer cannot be overstated as it will feed into the TPD review due latest 20 May. See our article “What do we know about the TPD application report” for more details.
Read more: Eurobarometer: Attitudes of Europeans towards tobacco and electronic cigarettes
Tobacco harm reduction news from Europe.
The Commission published their dismal Europe’s Beating Cancer Plan early in February. News from Germany added to the gloom, when the German finance minister revealed plans for exorbitant taxes on e liquids and to equate heated tobacco products with cigarettes there. Happily, the month ended well with the publication of Public Health England’s annual update, which confirmed that vaping is best for quitting smoking and that UK youth are not interested in vaping. Read on for more on that and lots of other news.
We have just written to the MEPs on the Special Committee on Beating Cancer (BECA) to express our dismay at some of the tobacco control measures proposed in the European Commission’s Beating Cancer plan.
We hope that our elected representatives can take our views into account at tomorrow's BECA meeting and exchange of views with Health Commissioner Stella Kyriakides.
Consumers and experts submitted in their thousands to the two public consultations last year, yet those views are ignored in the Plan.
The Plan spectacularly fails to make a distinction between harmful smoking products and smoke free alternatives and signals that the Commission intends to turn its back on innovation and science by cracking down on vaping, the popular and far less risky alternative to smoking.
Read our letter here.
Tobacco harm reduction news from Europe.
Contents:
EUROPE’S BEATING CANCER PLAN REPORT
ETHRA NICOTINE USERS SURVEY FIRST DATA
FLAVOUR BANS AND OTHER ANTI-THR MEASURES
TAX
ACCESS TO THR PRODUCTS IN LOCKDOWNS
UK GOVERNMENT LAUNCHES CONSULTATION ON TOBACCO AND RELA
TED PRODUCTS
WHO STUDY GROUP ON TOBACCO REGULATION MEETING
WHO 2
COMING UP
ETHRA WATCHES THE BREATHE VISION LAUNCH
EUROPE’S BEATING CANCER PLAN REPORT
Europe’s Beating Cancer Plan is an ambitious EU project which aims to reduce the cancer burden and address cancer related inequalities. The European Commission’s report for the Plan is due to be published on 3rd February but the draft was leaked to the media last week. According to the leaked document, the Plan’s proposals for reducing smoking are very hostile to tobacco harm reduction.