New vaping regulations in Quebec bans flavoured vapes
Posted October 30, 2023 9:02 pm.
Last Updated October 30, 2023 11:39 pm.
New regulations on vaping products, including a ban of all vape flavours except tobacco, are taking effect as of Oct. 31.
The new regulations are aimed at protecting young people from the harmful effects of vaping, but the Coalition des droits des vapoteurs du Québec says they are counterproductive and will only encourage people to find flavoured vapes elsewhere, such as the black market.
“It’s going to be more dangerous for those teenagers than it was,” said Valérie Gallant, spokesperson for the Coalition des droits des vapoteurs du Québec (CDVQ), a group that represents and advocates the consumer rights of Quebec vapers.
“When I started vaping in the beginning of 2010, people were making their own e-juices in the back of their garage. And I’m afraid that people would just go back at vaping whatever, making their own product,” Gallant said.
The ban of flavoured vapes applies in stores and online in Quebec. When the ban was first announced earlier in August, Quebec’s health minister Christian Dubé said in a press release that the new regulations “will ensure that these substances become less attractive for everyone.”
For Heart and Stroke, the foundation is pleased to hear about the ban and hopes the federal government and other provinces follow suit.
“Flavours entice young people to start vaping and nicotine keeps them hooked.”
“Flavours are a very powerful motivator in starting vape use,” said Foram Patel, policy analyst at Heart and Stroke. “It is also a very strong marketing tool used by the vaping industry. They know what they’re doing with it.”
“When you have flavored descriptors such as blueberry frost or cranberry frizz, tropic breeze, mango, passion fruit, that these are set in a way to attract young people to try on these products.”
In 2021, Heart and Stroke revealed that nine in ten of the 3,000 people aged between 16 and 24 they surveyed used flavoured vapes when they first started vaping, and that those who picked up the habit continued using flavoured vaping products.
Patel adding that the same study found close to half of the young people they surveyed “would stop vaping if flavors were made unavailable.”
The regulations now setting the maximum limit of nicotine concentration to 20 milligrams per milliliter for all vaping products and “certain information” to be disclosed on the products’ labels and packaging.
