Report Shines Light On Downside To Singapore's E-Cig Ban

A new report from Rice Media is shining light on a particularly obvious downside to Singapore’s electronic cigarette ban, namely the inability for the country’s smokers turned vapers to continue vaping instead of smoking.

Singapore’s electronic cigarette ban, which was announced in November of 2017, went into effect on February 2, 2018.

Benjamin Lim, reporting for Rice Media, interviewed a 26-year-old man in Singapore identified in the report as Haziq. According to Lim’s report, Haziq stopped using his e-cig after the country-wide ban on e-cigs was announced late last year. He has subsequently reverted back to his former habit in full: smoking.

Haziq now smokes a couple of packs of cigarettes per week, whereas before, when he was vaping, a pack might last him “9 to 10 days.”

“One pack of cigarettes could actually last me 9 to 10 days after I started vaping, and I would be smoking even less now.”

Meanwhile, in the United Kingdom, the government is rapidly adopting a much difference stance from that of Singapore’s as far as vaping is concerned. Public Health England (PHE), which is part of the United Kingdom’s national healthcare system, has even gone as far as to recommend that smokers take up vaping instead due to its apparent health benefit.

Based on the findings of an electronic cigarette review commissioned by PHE and conducted by independent experts, the latest evidence shows e-cigarettes to carry less than 5% of the risk associated with conventional cigarettes. Still, countries such as Singapore have put in place e-cig bans that diminish the ability of smokers to transition to what PHE and others believe to be a less harmful alternative. This in turn has an impact on the roughly 700,000 or so smokers that inhabit Singapore.

Singapore is by no means alone in their country-wide ban on e-cigs as there are other countries which have similar regulations in place prohibiting the sale, use, and possession of electronic cigarettes. Surprisingly to some, Australia has regulations which prohibit the use or possession of liquid nicotine without a physician’s recommendation. In other words, you can’t vape e-cigs in Australia unless you have a note from your doctor.