China plans to take steps to regulate the e-cigarette market as it worries about the health of consumers and of course why the sales of electronic cigarettes have been continuously increasing in recent years.
China's National Health Committee has launched an investigation into electronic cigarettes and is planning to issue new industry legislation, health chief Mao Qunan said at a press conference this week.
The effort came as Chinese start-up e-cigarette companies seem to have "escaped" in their quest to attract attention to the world's largest smoker market.
Vaping suppliers in China are currently unknown labs. At least 20 e-cigarette companies in China have raised funding since early 2019, according to data collected by Crunchbase.
All of these companies are facing China Tobacco's state monopoly, the world's largest cigarette maker, and provides the government with colossal tax revenue.
Some researchers support the use of e cigarettes can help adults stop smoking while others have shown that electronic cigarettes are just as addictive as traditional cigarettes.
The other major controversy is the growing use of electronic cigarettes among adolescents, which has led to California's ban on sales of these products.
China, on the other hand, reportedly applies more controls to new smoking technology. Research shows that heating aerosols produced by e-cigarettes can contain "many harmful substances" and that additives in e-cigarettes can "pose health risks", such as said Mao. It also said that controversial nicotine level labeling could lead to poor smoking behavior and lax device standards could lead to explosion of battery and other security incidents.
Like the US, China has also seen a worryingly high participation rate among young people, which is another reason that pushes Beijing to keep industry under control. The use of electronic cigarettes by children, adolescents and young adults has proven to be unsafe because nicotine, which is highly addictive, can damage brain development.
In May, China drew up a set of standards (PDF in Chinese) for electronic cigarettes that determine the level of nicotine, the type of additives, accessories and designs allowed in battery-powered smoking devices.
____________________
- SmartScreen disable on Windows Edge 10 1903
- Windows as a Service: Reasons and Controversy
- Privacy the history of a lost affair