Starter Kit 1200 Puffs Manufacturers

With over 40 percent of votes counted, California voters appear to be on the way to overwhelmingly approve Proposition 31, which bans sale in stores of vaping and tobacco products containing non-tobacco flavors. So far, 62 percent of voters have supported the flavor ban.Financial support for the ballot initiative came almost exclusively from billionaire anti-vaping activist Michael Bloomberg.Prop 31 allowed voting residents to approve or reject a bill passed in 2020 by a huge majority of the California Assembly. The law was put on hold for two years after tobacco companies bankrolled a signature-collection campaign to put the legislation to the voters.

A South Korean vaping industry organization is suing two government agencies for spreading misinformation about nicotine vaping that it says caused financial distress for many of its members. The group wants the government to correct the record. The Korea Electronic Cigarette Association (KECA), which represents about 4,000 vape product retailers, alleges that the Republic of Korea’s Ministry of Health and Welfare (MOHW) and Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) damaged the reputation of small vape businesses and caused them great financial harm.

Brazil’s justice ministry last week ordered 32 retailers in the country to cease selling vaping products or face stiff daily fines. The companies were given 48 hours to comply.

European Union lawmakers are proposing to ban flavored heated tobacco products — a category that covers vaping — in a move they say is intended to protect the health of young people after a “significant” rise in sales of novel heated tobacco products.The EU has set itself a goal of creating a ‘tobacco free generation’, and having less than 5% of the population using tobacco by 2040, as part of a major anti-cancer drive.

Last Friday, Hawaiian state legislators passed a “tax parity” law that applies the same tax rate to vaping products as combustible cigarettes. If signed into law by Governor Josh Green, vaping products would be subject to a 70 percent wholesale tax—one of the highest rates in the country. The bill also bans sales to consumers by out-of-state retailers, which essentially bans online sales by sellers outside Hawaii.

A European Commission public consultation on the legislative framework for tobacco products is underway and will accept responses until May 16. The consultation—the second part of a process that began in 2022—launched in late February. While the consultation seeks comments on all tobacco products, it is clearly aimed at introducing harsher regulation for e-cigarettes and other low-risk nicotine products. Comments solicited will be used to shape changes to the Tobacco Products Directive (TPD) and possibly the Tobacco Advertising Directive. The consultation itself was deliberately written to elicit anti-vaping responses, according to sources quoted in a Vejpkollen story. But it is the only tool European vapers and other nicotine product users have available to prevent the adoption of prohibitionist vaping laws.