A holey argument

A Netherlands-based anti-tobacco coalition comprising ex-smokers and medical associations is threatening to bring legal action to ban cigarettes that exceed ‘European norms for nicotine, tar and carbon monoxide,’ according to a story in DutchNews.nl relayed by the TMA.
Tests performed on 100 brands of cigarettes, the results of which were published by the Dutch public health institute RIVM in June, were said to have found that ‘the amount of tar can be up to 26 times the official norm’, while ‘nicotine and carbon monoxide levels were also high’.
The tests were carried out with the ventilation holes in the cigarette filters covered, whereas the official government test leaves these holes uncovered, which allows more environmental air – and therefore less smoke – to enter the testing machine.
Both the RIVM and the health and safety watchdog NVWA had previously pulled out of a commission which designed the European measuring method because 10 of the 12 members worked in the tobacco industry.
Philip Morris and British American Tobacco said their cigarettes complied with European norms and national Dutch legislation regarding tobacco.
“[T]he European test was never meant to measure “actual exposure” of smokers to tar, nicotine and carbon monoxide,’ said Peter van den Driest, spokesperson for Philip Morris. ‘It was meant to enable to compare brands of cigarettes that are smoked in an identical way.’
The coalition said that if the safety watchdog NVWA failed to enforce the tobacco legislation, it would go to court.
This issue has been the subject of at least one question posed to the European Commission. Last month, in answer to one such question, the Commission said that it was aware of the limitations of currently available methods for the measurement of cigarette deliveries of tar, nicotine and carbon monoxide.
It said that this issue was carefully considered during the revision of the Tobacco Products Directive (TPD) and that it was concluded there was insufficient evidence that would support the revision of the existing provisions.
The Commission said the results presented recently by the RIVM were in line with the measurements conducted by Hammond et al. in 2006, which indicated that ‘none of the smoking regimens currently in use adequately “represent” human smoking behaviour and none are significantly associated with measures of nicotine uptake among human participants’.
‘As the Commission pointed out in its replies to written questions E-003557/2017 and E-001317/2018, Article 4(3) of TPD empowers the Commission to adopt delegated acts to adapt the measurement methods, based on scientific and technical developments or internationally agreed standards,’ the Commission said. ‘The Commission will report on the application of the TPD by 2021.’