Commission out of touch

The public health community needs to adopt a consistent science-based view of new generation tobacco products in order to inform regulators around the world and thereby shape a stable framework, according to a EURACTIV.com interview with Dr. James Murphy, the head of Reduced Risk Substantiation at British American Tobacco.

Speaking to EURACTIV’s Sarantis Michalopoulos on the side-lines of the E-Cigarette Summit organized by the Royal Society in London, the world’s oldest independent scientific academy, Murphy said these products had the potential to become a global business.

“We think that by 2030, new generation products will be 30 percent of our business and by 2050 they could reach 50 percent,” he said.

Murphy said there was a huge body of scientific evidence, from academic, regulatory and public health science suggesting that the use of electronic cigarettes was far less harmful than was traditional smoking.

But Michalopoulos pointed out that the World Health Organization and the European Commission were still sceptical when it came to electronic cigarettes.

Martin Seychell, deputy director-general for health and food safety at the European Commission, was said to have told EURACTIV recently, “We should promote the concept that people should not be addicted in the first place”. “In a few words, prevention of addiction,” Seychell said.