Mexico’s proposed blanket ban on vapes has passed a major legal hurdle.
Lower house lawmakers voted overwhelmingly to change the country’s constitution to include a ban on vapes as well as synthetic drugs such as fentanyl.
The reform will be voted on in the Senate today, and is expected to pass as the ruling Morena party and its allies hold a strong majority.
Former President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, who sent the proposal to Congress before leaving office earlier this year, argued that vapes were damaging public health and getting young people hooked on nicotine.
Mexico’s president Claudia Sheinbaum has said her government is determined to implement the ban before January 2025.
Fears the ban will backfire
However, the move has prompted fears that an outright vapes ban will simply fuel an already out-of-control black market, led by powerful and violent organised crime gangs. Vaping advocates warn it will also harm smoking cessation efforts as cigarettes remain legal in Mexico.
Harm reduction expert Clive Bates said:
“A ban on far safer alternatives to cigarettes makes no sense while cigarettes are available everywhere. A ban will increase smoking, nourish the cigarette trade, and make it harder for Mexican citizens to reduce their risk of cancer, cardiovascular and respiratory disease. There is no case for supporting the tobacco industry in this way.”
He added that a ban on vapes does not make the products somehow disappear. It means they will now be supplied illegally through opportunists, criminal networks, and cartelism, which also means more violence, extortion and corruption.
He said: “A ban means the regulator becomes powerless, and the market becomes wholly unregulated. Dangerous and poor-quality products will enter Mexico illegally and may include products used for illicit drugs such as fentanyl.
“A ban is not about getting tough; it means walking away from responsibility. Prohibition allows only criminal supply and will close law-abiding, pro-health Mexican businesses, drawing in young people as dealers as well as consumers.”
Previous bans have failed
Currently, vapes are in a legal grey area after a previous ban on their import and sale - introduced in May 2020 - was successfully challenged in court. The ban was ruled to be unconstitutional by the Second Chamber of the Supreme Court last year as it ‘contravened freedom of commerce’.
The governing party Morena then won a landslide victory at the last elections in June, giving it a supermajority in congress. This means it can rewrite the constitution without effective opposition.
The new reform - passed last Tuesday by 410 votes to 24 - also sanctions the "production, distribution and sale of toxic substances, chemical precursors, the illicit use of fentanyl and other non-authorized synthetic drugs."
Fentanyl, while approved for some use medically, is also already banned in Mexico but remains widely available.
Workers' Party lawmaker Mary Carmen Bernal, who belongs to the ruling bloc, said: "We value girls', boys', and young people's right to good health above economic and political interests."
But opposition legislator Ector Jaime Ramirez warned that banning vapes and fentanyl in the same reform was excessive and "trivialising to the effort being made to combat the most addictive and dangerous drugs."
Around 1.7 million people are said to currently vape in Mexico - 1.32 per cent of the population. Meanwhile, the smoking rate is relatively high at 11.6 per cent (15 million people) and causes more than 50,000 deaths a year.
Vape advocates and harm reduction experts argue that a more effective alternative to banning vapes would be to regulate them in a similar way to tobacco and alcohol. These are monitored by health agencies, taxed, and illegal to buy for under 18s.
