The European Commission is to unveil its “evaluation report” on the EU’s Tobacco Control policy framework, according to a draft of the Commission’s work plan seen by Clearing the Air.
The package will focus on the highly contentious Tobacco Products Directive, which has been in force across the bloc since 2016 and regulates safer nicotine products like vaping and heated tobacco, but not nicotine pouches.
The Tobacco Advertising Directive – which does not cover safer nicotine products – will also form part of the review.
A cloud of disinformation
The evaluation is being completed by Commissioner Oliver Varheyli, who has been criticised for spreading disinformation about safer nicotine products.
Varheyli has done this at least twice this year, including:
Claiming that “vaping…has created completely new health risks [that are] comparable to or even bigger than smoking itself. It’s enough to read some articles about the “popcorn lungs” which is a completely new phenomenon and which is breathtakingly overtaking the young generation”. Vaping is far safer and there have been no recorded vases of popcorn lung in vapers.
Posting that “nicotine causes cancer” on X, deleting it minutes later and replacing it with the equally ridiculous “nicotine contributes to cancer development”.
Varheyli’s department will lead on publishing the evaluation report, unless he is ousted due to recent accusations that the Hungarian Representation to the EU hosted spies while he was in charge of it. Varheyli claims he was unaware.
A new proposal by 2027
The evaluation report marks the beginning of the end of the process to amend the EU’s tobacco control rules. Sources close to the file tell CTA that the timing of the evaluation report means that there will be a consultation on new rules before the end of 2026 and a proposal to amend the existing law during the first half of 2027.
At that point it will have to be agreed by EU countries and by an increasingly fractious European Parliament, which rejected an EU paper banning public vaping last year.
