The next stage of Australia’s vape ban will come into force tomorrow, with laws around the importation and sale set to get much tougher.
From March 1, the importation of all vapes, including rechargeable, will be banned without a licence. The range of flavours available is also set to become a lot more limited, with only mint, menthol or tobacco allowed.
Changes are also being made for those who import vapes for personal use. Until now, the personal importation scheme had allowed people to bring up to three months worth of vapes into Australia if they had a prescription.
This scheme will be wrapped up, with the only legal way to acquire vapes to be through a licensed pharmacist.
It’s not the end of the road for the vape ban either, with the Federal Government set to introduce legislation banning domestic manufacture of vapes in the coming weeks.
The anticipated changes will also ban advertisements featuring vapes, and companies will no longer be allowed to supply or possess vapes for any purposes, with the government saying it wants “controls across all levels of the supply chain”.
“Vaping is creating a whole new generation of nicotine dependency in our community, especially amongst young Australians,” said Minister for Health Mark Butler.
“The supply of vapes coming into Australia will gradually dry up over the course of 2024, for this reason we strongly encourage all recreational vapers to begin their journey of cessation.”
The ban on vapes first came into affect in January, with disposable or single-use vapes banned nationwide in an effort to curb growing rates of consumption.
It came over growing concerns that increasing numbers of young people were becoming addicted to nicotine. Although further research is needed, it is believed the number of under-18s who vaped had more than doubled from 2016 to 2019, with the numbers continuing to grow.
Since January, more than 360,000 vapes worth $11 million have been seized, almost three times as many as the entirety of last year.
