World Health Organization - Tobacco Reporter

COP Urged to Implement Harm Reduction

Consumer advocacy group Quit for Good asked the World Health Organization Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) to consider the lives of more than a billion smokers when it convenes the 10th Conference of the Parties in Panama next week.

Lorenzo Mata Jr., president of Quit for Good, said the WHO should implement FCTC Article 1 (d) on harm reduction strategies to help smokers. The treaty defines tobacco control as “a range of supply, demand and harm reduction strategies.”

“Offering safer nicotine products to millions of adult smokers who want to reduce their exposure to toxic substances from smoke is common sense. This is what tobacco harm reduction (THR) is all about, which the WHO FCTC refuses to implement despite being part of the global treaty,” Mata said.

Representatives from countries that are signatories to the FCTC will meet in Panama for the 10th Conference of the Parties this year, after the meeting was canceled in November 2023, to tackle major topics such as how to treat “novel and emerging tobacco and nicotine products.”

The Coalition of Asia Pacific Tobacco Harm Reduction Advocates (CAPHRA) said blocking the use of products that can help save smokers’ lives is against the mission of the FCTC—a global treaty endorsed by most countries.

“People who smoke should have the right to access less harmful alternatives to smoking, and the WHO FCTC should focus on helping them. We need a pragmatic campaign to reduce the harm caused by smoking, rather than a dogmatic, deceptive, ineffective campaign to compel abstinence,” CAPHRA executive coordinator Nancy Loucas said.

Loucas said the annual reviews of the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities, formerly Public Health England, have consistently shown that vaping carries a fraction of the risks of smoking. “Despite the overwhelming scientific evidence supporting vaping products as less harmful alternatives to smoking, the WHO has consistently disregarded the positive role that vaping can play in tobacco control,” she said.

“It is time for the WHO FCTC and its member states to listen to the voice of the people that they are supposed to fight for and not against—the over 1 billion smokers whose lives are in danger if they continue to smoke,” she said.

Loucas’ views were echoed by Jay Jazul, lead convener of the Harm Reduction Alliance of the Philippines (HARAP). “E-cigarettes do not threaten public health but provide smokers with an exit from smoking, which is the real problem,” he said. “The WHO’s failure to substantiate its claims against e-cigarettes and labeling these innovative products an emerging threat to public health is worrisome.”

“The nicotine was not the problem, it was the delivery system that was the problem. We’ve known that for 50 years,” said David Sweanor of the University of Ottawa at a recent conference in Korea.

“The best example of how products that don’t burn tobacco can benefit public health comes from Sweden, which has the lowest smoking prevalence among men in the European Union and consequently the lowest tobacco-related mortality,” said Lars M. Ramström, the principal investigator at the Institute for Tobacco Studies, which recently published a paper on the topic. Ramström served as a WHO expert and as secretary general of the 4^th World Conference on Smoking and Health.

“The meeting of the world’s health leaders in Panama, the COP10, represents a unique opportunity to take a fresh look at the most recent evidence with an open mind. After all, if Sweden had followed WHO’s advice from 20 years ago and banned snus, tobacco-related deaths in Sweden would have been much higher and the only unintended beneficiary profiting from such advice would be the cigarette industry,” said Ramström.

In the runup to COP10, industry representatives have raised concerns about the exclusion of stakeholders from the discussions.

January 30, 2024

Activists Criticize COP10 Tactics

The Coalition of Asia Pacific Tobacco Harm Reduction Advocates (CAPHRA) today issued a sharp critique of the World Health Organization’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) for its exclusion of consumer groups and harm reduction advocates from the 10th Session of the Conference of the Parties (COP10).

“CAPHRA argues that this exclusionary practice is in stark contrast to the successful, pragmatic approaches of countries like New Zealand, the Philippines and Malaysia, which have embraced vaping as a harm reduction tool,” said Nancy Loucas, a public health policy expert and passionate advocate for tobacco harm reduction and executive coordinator of CAPHRA.

The press release condemns the COP10 meetings for silencing the voices of those who advocate for harm reduction strategies, such as vaping, which have been shown to significantly reduce smoking prevalence in countries where they are available and regulated.

CAPHRA points out that the prohibitionist approach of countries like Australia, which recently banned vaping products, is not in the best interest of public health.

“CAPHRA calls on FCTC officials to open their minds to harm reduction and to consider the evidence from countries like New Zealand, where smoking rates have decreased due to the availability of regulated vaping products,” said Loucas.

The organization stresses the importance of including consumer groups in the decisionmaking process, as they provide essential insights into the needs of smokers and how alternative products can be used effectively.

January 25, 2024

WHO: Tobacco Use Continues to Decline

A new World Health Organization report shows that tobacco use continued to decline in 2022, with one in five adults consuming tobacco compared to one in three in 2000, according to the WHO.

According to the report, 150 countries are successfully reducing tobacco use.

“Good progress has been made in tobacco control in recent years, but there is no time for complacency,” said Ruediger Krech, director of the WHO Department of Health Promotion. “I’m astounded at the depths the tobacco industry will go to pursue profits at the expense of countless lives. We see that the minute a government thinks they have won the fight against tobacco, the tobacco industry seizes the opportunity to manipulate health policies and sell their deadly products.”

The WHO report shows that six countries continue to see an increase in tobacco use: Congo, Egypt, Indonesia, Jordan, Oman and the Republic of Moldova. The WHO is urging countries to continue putting in place tobacco control policies and to continue fighting against tobacco industry interference.

In February, countries are set to meet in Panama for the 10th session of the Conference of the Parties to the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, where the WHO claims the tobacco industry will attempt to influence countries’ tobacco control policies.

January 16, 2024

WHO Report ‘Unscientific”: Mata

A public health advocacy group based in the Philippines has criticized the latest report of the World Health Organization on the use of electronic cigarettes, saying the global body undermines the significant progress made in public health over the past two decades as smokers transitioned to smoke-free products.

Lorenzo Mata Jr., president of Quit for Good, said the WHO’s continued demonization of e-cigarettes disregards the wealth of scientific evidence demonstrating that smoke-free alternatives such as e-cigarettes, heated tobacco and snus have helped millions of smokers in countries like the United Kingdom, the United States, Japan and Sweden successfully quit smoking.

“The best available clinical and population studies consistently show that vaping has led to adult smoking cessation. While it is necessary to monitor youth vaping, a complete ban on e-cigarettes will only exacerbate the smoking epidemic and its associated serious health conditions,” Mata Jr. said in a statement.

As a Filipino physician, Mata said the WHO’s failure to differentiate between the risks of e-cigarettes and combustible tobacco is unscientific.

Last month, the WHO issued a statement calling for urgent action to safeguard children and prevent the adoption of e-cigarettes based on what Quit for Good insists is a misrepresented account of the scientific evidence to fit its predetermined conclusion to ban e-cigarettes or regulate them as strictly as far more dangerous cigarettes.

Additionally, the WHO provided data indicating that the global market for electronic cigarettes grew from $7.81 billion in 2015 to $22.35 million in 2022. Between 2018 and 2022, the disposable e-cigarette market expanded by 116 percent, encompassing over 550,000 different products.

Mata said the WHO’s diagnosis of the situation is flawed, as it fails to acknowledge the significant decline in harmful substance exposure resulting from smokers switching to e-cigarettes and other smoke-free alternatives, or the fact that smoke-free products work for many smokers better than traditional smoking cessation therapies.

“E-cigarettes do not threaten public health but provide smokers with an exit from smoking, which is the real problem. Labeling these innovative products an emerging threat to public health is worrisome because the WHO essentially tells smokers that continuing smoking is better than switching to e-cigarettes. This is patently wrong,” he said.

Quit for Good highlights that countries that banned e-cigarettes did not eradicate vaping but instead inadvertently created an unregulated underground market that poses risks to public health due to the absence of regulatory standards.

Mata said these bans only benefit unscrupulous criminal gangs that are happy to sell these products to anyone, including children, without any controls as to what’s in them or how they’re made.

According to independent public health experts, e-cigarettes and other smoke-free products offer an opportunity to combat smoking-related diseases such as cancer, heart disease and lung disease by transitioning to nicotine products with significantly reduced risk and no combustion.

Commenting on a similar WHO report published earlier, Peter Hajek, Director of the Tobacco Dependence Research Unit at Queen Mary University of London, said: “Given the tremendous benefits this transition would bring to public health, it is paradoxical that the WHO has adopted such a strident anti-vaping stance that risks impeding this progress. This new report perpetuates this tradition, calling for a ban on less risky alternatives while freely allowing the sale of tobacco. The report misrepresents evidence and should come with a prominent health warning.”

John Britton, an emeritus professor of Epidemiology at the University of Nottingham, said the WHO still fails to differentiate between addiction to tobacco smoking, which leads to millions of deaths annually, and addiction to nicotine, which does not.

“The WHO appears content with the inconsistency of recommending medicinal nicotine products for treating smoking addiction while advocating the prohibition of consumer nicotine products that serve the same purpose, but more effectively. The WHO is correct in discouraging non-smokers, particularly children, from using any nicotine product. However, for over a billion tobacco smokers worldwide, electronic nicotine delivery systems are part of the solution, not the problem,” Britton said.

Mata said many countries, including the Philippines, have in fact chosen to embrace scientific evidence and regulate the use of innovative smoke-free products such as e-cigarettes to provide smokers with better options to quit.

January 15, 2024

WHO Announcement Provokes Backlash

Tobacco harm reduction advocates have vehemently criticized the World Health Organization’s call to crack down on e-cigarettes.

On Dec. 14, the global health body issued a statement urging action to prevent the uptake of e-cigarettes and counter nicotine addiction. On the same day, it released a technical note with detailed information on the evidence and factors underpinning its guidance.

“E-cigarettes as consumer products are not shown to be effective for quitting tobacco use at the population level,” the WHO wrote. “Instead, alarming evidence has emerged on adverse population health effects.”

In its announcement, the WHO described e-cigarettes with nicotine as highly addictive and harmful to health. “Whilst long-term health effects are not fully understood, it has been established that they generate toxic substances, some of which are known to cause cancer and some that increase the risk of heart and lung disorders,” the organization wrote.

“Use of e-cigarettes can also affect brain development and lead to learning disorders for young people. Fetal exposure to e-cigarettes can adversely affect the development of the fetus in pregnant women. Exposure to emissions from e-cigarettes also poses risks to bystanders.”

To address the impact of e-cigarettes, the WHO encouraged national governments to ban vape flavors, limit the concentration of nicotine, and tax e-cigarettes.

Tobacco harm reduction activists were aghast. “The WHO’s latest stance on vaping flavors is not just misguided, it’s dangerously out of touch with scientific reality,” wrote Michael Landl, director of the World Vapers’ Alliance, in a statement.

“By pushing for a blanket ban, the WHO blatantly disregards a wealth of scientific evidence that underscores the benefits of vaping when compared to alternatives. Flavored e-cigarettes have been proven to increase the chances of successful smoking cessation by 230 percent compared to non-flavored alternatives. It’s appalling to see such a pivotal public health tool being dismissed by an organization that should be at the forefront of harm reduction.”

The WHO’s attack on vaping is both inaccurate and misleading and will further discourage smokers from making the life-changing decision to quit.

John Dunne, director general, UKVIA

The U.K. Vaping Industry Association said the WHO announcement was based on discredited research and predicted that the measures would be “disastrous” for public health.

“The WHO’s attack on vaping is both inaccurate and misleading and will further discourage smokers from making the life-changing decision to quit,” said UKVIA Director General John Dunne in a statement. “Vapes are 95 percent less harmful than cigarettes and are responsible for an accelerated drop in smoking in the U.K. in the past decade.”

“The WHO’s criticism of vaping is based on discredited research and implying that vaping is in some way proven to be cancer-causing is wholly misleading, as is the claim that it harms brain development in young people, a scare story that is simply not true.

“Banning flavored vapes would lead to more smokers and more smoking deaths. Indeed, 80 percent of vapers consider the availability of flavors to be a significant part of their quitting journey, according to One Poll in March 2023. 24 percent of respondents said that banning flavors would likely lead them to revert to smoking, potentially affecting over 1.1 million individuals in the UK.

“Restricting adult access to vapes has had disastrous consequences around the world, such as in Australia, where it has resulted in a massive unregulated black market and a boost to smoking rates.”

Earlier this month, tobacco harm reduction specialists raised concern about the FCTC’s direction of travel in a special report published by Forniche.

December 15, 2023

WHO Seeks to Equate Vaping and Smoking

The World Health Organization has urged governments to ban all flavors in e-cigarettes, treating them like combustible products.

While some consider e-cigarettes a key to reducing death and disease caused by smoking, the WHO said “urgent measures” are needed to control them, according to Reuters.

“Kids are being recruited and trapped at an early age to use e-cigarettes and may get hooked to nicotine,” said Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO director-general.

Regulating vapes like cigarettes would only serve to reinforce misunderstandings about the relative risks of vaping and send the wrong message to smokers.

Marina Murphy, senior director of scientific and medical affairs, ANDS

He urged countries to implement strict measures, such as bans on all flavors and introducing tobacco control measures to vapor products. These would include high taxes and vape bans in public places.

While the WHO does not have authority over national regulations, its recommendations are often voluntarily adopted.

“Regulating vapes like cigarettes would only serve to reinforce misunderstandings about the relative risks of vaping and send the wrong message to smokers,” said Marina Murphy, senior director of scientific and medical affairs at ANDS, adding that the WHO’s position was “detached from reality.”

December 14, 2023

New COP and MOP Dates Announced

The World Health Organization has announced the dates for the resumed in-person sessions of the 10th session of the Conference of the Parties (COP10) to the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) and the third session of the Meeting of the Parties (MOP3) to the Protocol to Eliminate Illicit Trade in Tobacco Products.

Following communication received from Panama, the host country of COP10 and MOP3, and in consultation with the Bureaus of the Conference of the Parties to the FCTC and of the Meeting of the Parties to the Protocol, the dates for the resumed in-person sessions of COP10 and MOP3 have now been set as follows:

Resumed COP10: Feb. 5-10, 2024
Resumed MOP3: Feb 12-15, 2024

November 28, 2023

‘Systemic Failures’ Blamed for COP Delay

The Coalition of Asia Pacific Tobacco Harm Reduction Advocates (CAPHRA) blames “systemic failures” at the World Health Organization Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) for the postponement of the 10th Conference of the Parties (COP10) that was due to take place last week in Panama.

“While the ‘official’ reason for the postponement of the conference was said to be security issues on the ground in Panama, it has come to light that the unfulfilled COP10 organization contract for which $5 million was allocated by the Panamanian Ministry of Health was terminated by the government at the end of October, finding itself without any service provider to ensure the event took place,” CAPHRA wrote in an e-mailed statement.

“The fact that the WHO FCTC knew in October that they did not have a venue or conference planning underway and waited until the week before the conference was due to begin before cancelling it shows contempt for member states and a blatant disregard and dismissal of the months spent creating and submitting position papers, requesting budget allocations from their governments and planning their attendance—including airfares, visas and hotel reservations,” the tobacco harm reduction group wrote.

“But then again, it seems a nonissue that $5 million disappeared, said the CAPHRA. Money that doctors in Panama said would be better spent on actual healthcare in the country—incubators, medicines and facilities.”

According to CAPHRA, the WHO FCTC’s actions not only threaten public health but also cause economic strain and foster next-generation addiction.

“The WHO FCTC is tone deaf to anything or anyone that questions the work they are mandated to do,” said CAPHRA Executive Coordinator Nancy Loucas. “This includes sabotaging health policies, negatively impacting the environment and using funds from Big Pharma and the Bloomberg Foundation, among others, to promote misleading narratives and undermine tobacco harm reduction efforts.”

November 27, 2023

COP10 Postponed

The Tenth session of the Conference of the Parties (COP10) to the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) and the Third session of the Meeting of the Parties (MOP3) to the Protocol to Eliminate Illicit Trade in Tobacco Products have been postponed to 2024.

“Following communication received from Panama, the host country of the Tenth session of the Conference of the Parties to the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control and the Third session of the Meeting of the Parties to the Protocol to Eliminate Illicit Trade in Tobacco Products, it is no longer possible to conduct COP10 and MOP3 in November 2023, as scheduled,” the FCTC wrote on its website.

The sessions are expected to be held in Panama, as early as possible in 2024, at dates to be confirmed.

The postponement of COP10 and MOP3 is due to the current security situation in Panama, which has been shaken by mass protests about a government contract that allows a Canadian company to expand its copper mining operations there.

The Convention Secretariat said it will communicate further details in relation to COP10 and MOP3, as soon as available.

November 9, 2023

Activists Slam Report

The World Health Organization’s recently published report on the global tobacco “pandemic” discounts the impact of harm reduction and vaping, according to Michael Landl, director of the World Vapers’ Alliance

“While filled with biased anti-vaping scaremongering and unfounded claims, the report’s overall direction is perplexing. Instead of prioritizing the crucial goal of reducing smoking rates, the WHO is directing its focus on vaping, which happens to be the most potent smoking cessation tool available.”

In the report’s foreword, Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus asserts that vaping would undermine anti-smoking efforts, claiming that e-cigarettes are harmful to both the people using them and those around them.

“Regrettably, the WHO appears to ignore reality and scientific evidence,” said Landl in a statement. “Countries that adopt an open and consumer-friendly approach to harm reduction products achieve significantly better results than those following WHO’s misguided path. Comparative data from Sweden and the United Kingdom demonstrate their remarkable success in reducing smoking rates, surpassing countries with a negative harm reduction approach by a wide margin.”

The WHO report also claims a gateway effect from vaping to smoking and alleges that vaping flavors target children. It further highlights that 121 countries have adopted vaping regulations, with 34 completely banning vape sales.

“The outdated and debunked theories propagated by the WHO report pose risks to public health,” said Landl. “The notion of a gateway effect from vaping to smoking lacks evidence. Furthermore, flavors are essential for adults as they play a crucial role in helping millions of smokers transition to vaping. Additionally, celebrating countries which ban a way less harmful alternative for smokers is absurd.”

According to a review of 15 studies, “a true gateway effect in youths has not yet been demonstrated,” according to Landl. Factors such as anxiety, parental smoking habits, peer attitudes and household income must be considered, he noted. Another study found that vaping is not a gateway to smoking but rather that negative circumstances in teenagers’ lives lead to risky behaviors. According to the Yale School of Public Health, vaping flavored e-cigarettes is linked to a 230 percent increase in adult smoking cessation, and a flavor ban, as suggested by the WHO, could drive five out of 10 vapers back to smoking or the black market.

“The lack of empathy for smokers and vapers, coupled with the outright denial of scientific findings, will have severe consequences for many lives,” said Landl. “The WHO seems to have lost sight of its ultimate goal – reducing smoking rates. While we all agree that teenagers should not smoke or vape, the report notes that only 45 percent of countries ban e-cigarette sales to minors, and 10 percent of countries impose no age restrictions on cigarette purchases. Why not address these real-life challenges? The WHO systematically disregards an abundance of scientific evidence supporting the benefits of vaping, not to mention the experiences of millions of vapers. Vaping is 95 percent less harmful than smoking and a more effective method to quit smoking compared to traditional products like gum and patches. Restricting or banning access to vaping will only lead to unnecessary loss of lives.”

August 1, 2023

Tag: World Health Organization