Tag: Coalition of Asia Pacific Tobacco Harm Reduction Advocates

COP Delegations Urged to Include Consumers

Photo: Oleg
Country delegations to the 10th Conference of the Parties (COP10) to the World Health Organization’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) should include at least one consumer of safer nicotine products, according to the Coalition of Asia Pacific Tobacco Harm Reduction Advocates (CAPHRA).
In a letter to their respective countries’ FCTC delegations, CAPHRA member organizations stressed the importance of listening to consumers. “Consumers are an untapped experience and knowledge base who are not represented inclusively in the FCTC process,” the letter states. “Delegates to COP10 should be representing the rights and aspirations of the citizens.”
CAPHRA insists that adults have the right to make choices that help them avoid adverse health outcomes, and people who smoke have the right to access less harmful nicotine products as alternatives to combustible and unsafe tobacco. What’s more, they have the right to participate in the policymaking process that directly impacts their right to health and well-being, the letter notes.
CAPHRA Executive Director Nancy Loucas said that exclusion of consumer voices has contributed to misinformation, disinformation and failures of tobacco control policy.
“Millions have successfully used vaping to move away from combustibles and unsafe oral nicotine products, yet the FCTC looks set to bury its head in the sand again at COP10. CAPHRA believes visiting delegations must include a consumer voice to give at least some balance to all the misinformation,” says Loucas.
COP10 will be held in Panama in November.
March 20, 2023
‘Thailand to Legalize Vaping After Elections’
Asa Saligupta
Activists are confident that Thailand will legalize vaping after the likely general elections in May. Vaping is currently prohibited in the kingdom, but discussions are ongoing to end the ban, according to ENDS Cigarette Smoke Thailand (ECST).
“This work has been several years in the making. It hasn’t stopped. In fact, draft vaping legislation awaits Thailand’s parliament to debate and ratify,” said ECST Director Asa Saligupta.
Saligupta notes that while anti-vaping campaigners appear to have the ear of the public health minister, most politicians and the public remain supportive of lifting the country’s vaping ban.
“I remain fully confident that safer nicotine products will be regulated in Thailand. Regulation will give consumers better protection, encourage more smokers to quit deadly cigarettes, and ensure we have much better control over youth vaping with a strict purchase age,” he said.
ECST says smoking kills about 50,000 Thai people every year.
“If we want to substantially reduce smoking-related illnesses and premature deaths, we must lift Thailand’s harsh ban and penalties on vape products,” said Saligupta.
According to ECST, nearly 70 countries have adopted regulatory frameworks on safer nicotine products, leading to dramatic declines in their overall smoking rates.
February 23, 2023
Activists: Differentiate Smoking and Vaping

Photo: Andrey Popov
Malaysian lawmakers must distinguish between smoking and vaping it they want to tackle Malaysia’s smoking epidemic, according to tobacco harm reduction advocates.
Legislators are currently scrutinizing a bill that would ban smoking and vaping for those born after 2007 in Malaysia. The bill is modelled on legislation in New Zealand, which in December 2021 revealed a plan to phase out smoking by gradually raising the smoking age until it covers the entire population.
Unlike Malaysia’s proposal, however, New Zealand’s generational ban would prohibit only the sale of tobacco products to anyone born during or after 2009, with vaping products remaining available to those 18 years and older to purchase in retail outlets as was regulated in 2020.
Samsul Ariffin
“You can’t ban cigarettes for future Malaysian adults without providing a safer, viable alternative,” said Samsul Ariffin, president of the Malaysian Organization of Vape Entities. “It’s like banning sugary drinks and sugar-free drinks all at once and hoping it will get people off sugar. If our political leaders are serious about eradicating deadly smoking, Malaysia’s generational endgame bill must only ban the purchase of combustible tobacco, not safer nicotine products.”
According to the Coalition of Asia Pacific Tobacco Harm Reduction Advocates (CAPHRA), New Zealand’s encouragement of smoking cessation through vaping has contributed to a rapid decline in the country’s smoking rate. New Zealand’s current adult daily smoking rate stands at 9.4 percent, down from 18 percent in 2006-2007.
“New Zealand’s smoking has halved in recent years not because they banned vaping but because they embraced it,” said Nancy Loucas, executive coordinator of CAPHRA.
September 5, 2022
CAPHRA Condemns Anti-Vaping Campaign
“By stirring up anti-vaping hysteria, New Zealand’s Asthma and Respiratory Foundation will only send more minors back to smoking and put the country’s decade long Smokefree 2025 ambition in jeopardy,” says Nancy Loucas, executive coordinator of the Coalition of Asia Pacific Tobacco Harm Reduction Advocates (CAPHRA).
Loucas’ comments follow the Asthma and Respiratory Foundation (ARFNZ) launching a video series titled, “Spotlight on Vaping.” The campaign claims New Zealand is experiencing an “epidemic” of youth vaping. Together with the Secondary Principals’ Association of NZ (SPANZ), it also claims over a quarter of students have vaped in the past week.
“What these sensationalized numbers don’t take into account is, if 26 percent of school students had in fact vaped in the past week, many would only be trying it, and secondly, almost all of them would’ve been smoking deadly cigarettes a generation ago,” says Loucas.
CAPHRA says while smoking-related illnesses kill around 5,000 New Zealanders every year, vaping has not reportedly caused one death in the country. In fact, vaping been widely attributed for positively contributing to New Zealand’s plummeting smoking rate. The overall adult daily smoking rate has fallen from 18 percent in 2006/07 to 9.4 percent in 2020-2021.
“What ARFNZ fails to mention is [that] the 2021 ASH Year 10 Snapshot survey that they selectively refer to confirms that vaping is not hooking nonsmokers. In that survey, just 3 percent of those who vape daily have never smoked. What’s more, while many may try it, very few ever become regular vapers, particularly non-smoking students,” she says.
Loucas says while ARFNZ attract headlines by alleging a “youth vaping epidemic,” University of Auckland researchers in 2020 came to a different conclusion: “Our findings do not support the notion of a so-called vaping epidemic in New Zealand or a large youth population dependent on vaping,” the researchers wrote
“While no one wants youth vaping, we are not seeing an ‘epidemic’ as ARFNZ would have the public believe.

June 17, 2022
Global THR Proponents Unite Ahead of COP10
A global audience, via multiple platforms, tuned into watch sCOPe’s two-day broadcast during the recent World Vape Day (WVD) and World No Tobacco day (WNTD).
“sCOPe22’s success was critical given delegates will be discussing and debating harm reduced products at next year’s COP10 [the 10th session of the Conference of the Parties to the World Health Organization’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control]. sCOPe22 showed that consumer advocates worldwide are united and highly motivated to fight for millions of smokers’ lives,” said Nancy Loucas of the Coalition of Asia Pacific Tobacco Harm Reduction Advocates (CAPHRA).
Tobacco harm reduction (THR) consumer advocates livestreamed for eight hours on May 30 and May 31. The panel discussions and presentations included representatives from Asia Pacific, Africa, Europe, North America and Latin America.
sCOPe’s return on #WVD22 and #WNTD22 followed its five-day livestream last year during COP9—the ninth Conference of Parties to the World Health Organization (WHO) Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC).
“Countries represented at COP10 need to fully understand that millions of lives depend on delegates’ substantive discussions and subsequent recommendations on safer nicotine products next year. The red light must turn green—It’s long overdue.
“Last year the FCTC kicked the subject for touch, but next year it’s all on. All eyes will be on COP10 to see if delegates start following the evidence not the emotion. THR works. Vaping bans don’t, and THR advocates are keener than ever to expose and change WHO’s fraught position,” said Loucas.

Countries represented at COP10 need to fully understand that millions of lives depend on delegates’ substantive discussions and subsequent recommendations on safer nicotine products next year.
Nancy Loucas, CAPHRA
sCOPe22 participants included the European Tobacco Harm Reduction Advocates, Vaping Saved My Life South Africa, Association of Vapers India and CAPHRA.
The Americas were also well represented with Latin American-based ARDT Iberoamerica, Rights For Vapers Canada, the Tobacco Harm Reduction Association of Canada, and the U.S. Consumer Advocates for Smoke-free Alternatives Association.
“sCOPe22 uncovered many powerful personal stories of ex-smokers whose lives have been saved by switching to 95 percent-less harmful vaping. Instead of demonizing safer nicotine products, WHO needs to embrace them. Outrageously, WHO’s misguided advice and bullying sees hundreds of millions of smokers still blocked from accessing these life-saving products,” said Loucas.
According to Loucas, THR advocates are buoyed by the fact that every year more and more countries are ignoring WHO’s anti-vaping campaign. Instead, they’re legalizing and regulating safer nicotine products.
“In the Asia Pacific region alone, The Philippines, Malaysia and Thailand are set to join nearly 70 countries worldwide which have wisely regulated vaping with dramatic declines in their overall smoking rates. If WHO wants to improve global health and save smokers’ lives, they’d promote a THR approach next year—at the latest,” she said.
June 6, 2022
Livestream to ‘Expose Anti-Vape Agenda’
sCOPe, a global livestream featuring leading tobacco harm reduction (THR) advocates, will broadcast again on both World Vape Day and World No Tobacco Day.
During the event, European, African, Indian, North and South American, and Asia-Pacific THR consumer organizations will discuss advocacy and issues in their countries and take questions from viewers.
The two-day sCOPe22 livestream will broadcast for World Vape Day 2022 on May 30 and broadcast for World No Tobacco Day 2022 on May 31. It will run for eight hours each day from 07:00 CDT/13:00 BST.
“This sCOPe livestream is so important. Too many smokers continue to die from the narrow-mindedness of an anti-vape agenda that has been funded by the likes of American billionaires,” says Nancy Loucas of the Coalition of Asia Pacific Tobacco Harm Reduction Advocates (CAPHRA).
“The global evidence is overwhelmingly in favor of vaping, yet hundreds of millions of smokers are blocked from accessing harm reduced alternatives. People’s health and human rights are denied in favor of greed and ego. sCOPe 2022 will discuss where the money is coming from and expose the motivation,” says Loucas.
The organizations set to feature include European Tobacco Harm Reduction Advocates, the Campaign for Safer Alternatives in Africa, Vaping Saved My Life South Africa, the Association of Vapers India, and the CAPHRA.
The Americas are represented by Latin American-based ARDT Iberoamerica, Rights for Vapers Canada, the Tobacco Harm Reduction Association of Canada, and United States-based Consumer Advocates for Smoke-Free Alternatives Association.
Last year, sCOPe livestreamed around the clock from Nov. 8 to Nov. 12 during COP9—the Ninth Conference of the Parties to the World Health Organization Framework Convention on Tobacco Control. The unprecedented broadcast gave a global voice to leading consumer advocates who were shut out of COP9.
May 2, 2022
Kiwi Health Director Urged to Permit Flavors

Photo: asanojunki0110
The attitude and actions of the next director-general of health will be key to New Zealand achieving its smokefree ambitions, says the Coalition of Asia Pacific Tobacco Harm Reduction Advocates (CAPHRA).
“This person could make or break Smokefree 2025. He or she advises the government, oversees regulation, and has the final say on new vape store licences. It’s an incredibly important position when it comes to New Zealand effectively addressing tobacco,” says Nancy Loucas, executive coordinator of the Coalition of Asia Pacific Tobacco Harm Advocates (CAPHRA).
Current Director-General of Health Ashley Bloomfield will leave the job in July, with his successor yet to be appointed.
Loucas says that while New Zealand’s Smokefree Environments and Regulated Products (Vaping) Amendment Act 2020 is viewed internationally as relatively progressive, there are some provisions that the next director-general should review.
“The act claims to strike a balance between ensuring vaping products are available to adult smokers while protecting young people. Sanctioning it as an R18 product has helped achieve that. However, banning the most popular flavours from general retail is only stopping adult smokers from quitting deadly tobacco,” she says.
Since August 11, 2021, general retailers such as supermarkets, service stations and convenience stores have been limited to just selling three flavors–mint, menthol and tobacco. Only licenced specialist vape stores can sell a full range of more popular flavours.
“The next Director-General of Health must review this restriction on general retail. By the time he or she takes office, the flavor ban would have run a year and many of us strongly believe it’s hindering not helping New Zealand achieve Smokefree 2025.
“Adult smokers desperate to quit can go to a supermarket and choose any brand of cigarette under the sun, yet they can only choose from three vape flavors. That’s not enabling them to make the best decision for their health nor is it helping New Zealand reduce its smoking rate,” says Loucas.

This person could make or break Smokefree 2025. He or she advises the government, oversees regulation, and has the final say on new vape store licences. It’s an incredibly important position when it comes to New Zealand effectively addressing tobacco.
Nancy Loucas, executive coordiinator, CAPHRA
With youth smoking at a historic low and 9.4 percent of adults now daily smoking, New Zealand’s goal of Smokefree 2025—where 5 percent or less of the general population smoke—is looking increasingly likely to be achieved.
CAPHRA says overall Bloomfield has been a supporter of New Zealand’s Tobacco Harm Reduction public health strategy. This has included approving and promoting messages on the ministry of health’s Vaping Facts website, which headlines “vaping is less harmful than smoking”—an approach that has been heavily supported across New Zealand’s health sector.
Late last year Associate Health Minister Ayesha Verrall released the government’s Smokefree Aotearoa 2025 Action Plan.
At the time, CAPHRA and other THR advocates raised concerns that vaping—a 95 percent less harmful alternative and New Zealand’s most effective smoking cessation tool—is largely absent from the government’s reinvigorated approach to stamping out smoking.
“The smokefree action plan makes tobacco less available and less appealing. It fails, however, to fully acknowledge the positive role vaping has played, and will play, in getting Kiwis off the cancer sticks. That’s a worry because we won’t get there without safer nicotine products,” she says.
CAPHRA says top of mind for the next director-general of health is that fact that over 5,000 Kiwis continue to die from smoking-related illnesses every year, and the job to reduce that is by no means done.
“The next director-general of health will need to keep a close eye on whether the government’s vaping regulations and Smokefree Aotearoa 2025 Action Plan are in fact delivering on their promise. With so many lives at stake, he or she will have no time to waste,” says Nancy Loucas.
April 25, 2022
Vaping Advocates Launch ‘Best Practices’ Series

Tobacco harm reduction (THR) advocates will come together over the next two months to brainstorm, download and debate the best ways to advance safer nicotine products globally.
Nancy Loucas
“Advocates from around the world have been asking for seminars on the nuts and bolts of advocacy, what is effective, where to find information and how to get the message across. This new online series will address a real need out there,” says Nancy Loucas, executive coordinator for the Coalition of Asia Pacific Tobacco Harm Reduction Advocates (CAPHRA).
Dubbed the Advocates Voice Shorts Series, five sessions will be livestreamed fortnightly, launching on March 26 and finishing up on May 21.
“It’s obvious that the war on nicotine is not going away. Advocates need information and support to carry on fighting as THR is here to stay. Nearly 70 countries have already adopted regulatory frameworks on safer nicotine products, leading to dramatic declines in their overall smoking rates. If we are to save millions of more lives, our advocacy needs to be incredibly effective,” says Loucas.
Each of the five programs will start with a short video presentation followed by a live Q&A session for advocates to help each other. Those actively campaigning for adults to have access to safer nicotine products in their respective countries will discuss and detail the issues and questions they encounter.
The episodes will run via the CAPHRA and sCOPe YouTube channels at 12:00 p.m. NZT. To view the series promotion and see the links for each program, visit https://youtu.be/4H9CdRGv0zk.
“In recent years, effective advocacy has been key to many countries adopting a THR approach. Advocates coming together for this initiative and discussing best practice will be time well spent. The aim for us as always is to deliver tangible results, namely saving smokers’ lives,” says Loucas.
March 16, 2022
Duterte Urged to Sign Vaping Bill

Photo: Gajus
The Coalition of Asia Pacific Tobacco Harm Reduction Advocates (CAPHRA) has written to Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte asking him to urgently sign the Vaporized Nicotine Products Regulation Act into law.
Both the Philippine Senate and House of Representatives have ratified the harmonized version of the act, which will regulate the use, manufacture, importation, sale, distribution and promotion of vaping and heated-tobacco products. It now awaits the president’s signature or veto.
“The weight of the scientific evidence shows that potentially thousands of Filipino lives can be saved by making this act the law of the land,” wrote CAPHRA, backed by its expert advisory group and member organizations throughout the Asia-Pacific region.
CAPHRA told Duterte that, when enacted, the legislation will provide 16 million Filipino smokers with the world’s most effective smoking cessation tool, saving the lives and enhancing the health of millions of Filipino smokers and their families, friends and co-workers.
“Hundreds of peer-reviewed international scientific studies have found innovative smoke-free products such as e-cigarettes and heated-tobacco products to be far less harmful than combustible tobacco and offer the best options to make smokers switch or quit,” wrote Nancy Loucas, executive coordinator of CAPHRA. “The act will ensure the regulation of these products so that they meet government standards to protect consumers and will contribute revenue via taxation.”
The letter said signing the act into law and giving Filipino smokers the option of choosing less harmful alternative nicotine products will create an enduring presidential legacy. It will prove to the world that Duterte is a leader who put the health and well-being of his people, based on science, above the special interests of foreigners.
February 28, 2022
Activists Welcome Thai Plan to Legalize E-Cigs
Asa Saligupta
Tobacco harm reduction advocates have welcomed Thailand’s plans to legalize and regulate vapor products.
“Countries which have chosen to legalize and regulate e-cigarettes have seen a fall in overall smoking rates and have much better control over youth vaping. It’s exciting for Thailand, and in fact the world, that the government is now set to overturn its ban on the sale of vape products,” says Asa Saligupta, director of ENDS Cigarette Smoke Thailand (ECST).
According to Saligupta, Thailand’s harsh ban and penalties on vape sales has meant too many smokers have been stuck with cigarettes, while young people buy e-cigarettes in the underground economy with no control over the purchase age or product safety standards.
“We’ve seen the legalization and regulation of vaping in places like the United States, United Kingdom and New Zealand work very well. I’m delighted the Thai government is now listening to the science with the adoption of effective tobacco harm reduction (THR) policies now increasingly imminent,” he says.
The ECST director says Digital Economy and Society Minister Chaiwut Thanakamanusorn, government officials, public health experts and advocates have all been key to finally addressing Thailand’s failed tobacco control policies.
He says that, despite the minister adopting an evidence-based approach, local conservative health groups continue to unfairly target him and publicly scaremonger.
“It was a big breakthrough last year when the minister told local media that vaping is safer for people trying to quit smoking. Since then, he has walked the talk—looking at ways vaping can be legalized. He fully understands it offers smokers a less harmful alternative to deadly cigarettes and protects non-smokers from the dangers of second-hand smoke.
“Consumer groups like ours have worked hard to encourage our politicians and officials to follow the significant international public health evidence. It has been a long journey, but we’re pleased with the progress the government’s working group continues to make on legalizing e-cigarette sales,” says Saligupta.
International research also shows countries which have adopted progressive policies around vaping have seen their smoking rates fall twice as fast as those countries that haven’t.
Nancy Loucas
Nancy Loucas, executive coordinator of The Coalition of Asia Pacific Tobacco Harm Advocates (CAPHRA), says that by lifting its long ban on vape sales, Thailand will join about 70 countries that have legalized vaping.
“Around the world, vaping is saving millions of ex-smokers’ lives and can save many more if safer nicotine products are embraced, not demonized,” says Loucas. “Thailand’s 10 million smokers have long deserved a readily and legally available alternative to cigarettes. The country’s sky-high smoking rate is totally unacceptable but thanks to the work of ECST and others, it’s about to be seriously addressed.”
According to Loucas, Thailand has become increasingly isolated internationally with its harsh policies. Vapers currently risk arrests, sanctions and even imprisonment.
“By legalizing that sale of vapes, Thailand will join countries like the Philippines and Malaysia which are also waking up to the fact that vaping bans inevitably fail, leading to unnecessary smoking-related illnesses and deaths,” says Loucas.
February 14, 2022