Christopher Russell | 4 October 2015
The finding of a recent survey commissioned by the UK charity Action on Smoking and Health (ASH) [1] that the proportion of 11-18 year olds in the UK who have tried using an electronic cigarette at least once rose from 5% in 2013 to 13% in 2015 will almost certainly lead to calls for greater restrictions to be placed on the ability of manufacturers and vendors to advertise nicotine vapour products. Perhaps there will even be calls, in time, for nicotine vapour products to be sold only in plain packaging as now occurs with all tobacco products in Australia. But are greater restrictions on the advertising of electronic cigarettes consistent with the priority public health goal of reducing tobacco-related disease?