Secretary for Administration and Justice André Cheong Weng Chon, who is also the spokesman for the government’s top advisory Executive Council, Cheong has announced that the government has finished drafting amendments to the Tobacco Prevention and Control Law, which proposes to ban the import and export of e-cigarettes, in addition to the current ban on their sale in the city.
The amendment bill will be submitted to the Legislative Assembly (AL) in due course for debate, review and vote.
Cheong made the announcement during a press conference at Government Headquarters on Friday.
While the current version of the Tobacco Prevention and Control Law, which has been in force since January 2018, bans the sale of e-cigarettes in Macau, it does not ban their import and export.
In a report published last year, the Health Bureau (SSM) suggested that Macau should also ban the import of e-cigarettes.
Like traditional tobacco products, Cheong underlined, the use of e-cigarettes is also harmful to health, particularly for pregnant women, children and teenagers. Cheong said that someone’s use of e-cigarettes will also expose non-smokers to nicotine and other harmful chemicals, because of which, he said, the government has drafted the amendment bill.
According to Cheong, the amendment bill proposes to ban the manufacture, distribution, sale, import and export of e-cigarettes.
Cheong said that according to the amendment bill, travellers will be barred from bringing e-cigarettes into and taking them out of Macau.
The amendment bill proposes that individual offenders will be fined 4,000 patacas, while companies and any other private-sector entities violating the ban will face a fine of between 20,000 patacas and 200,000 patacas.
The proposed fines of 4,000 patacas for individuals, and those of between 20,000 and 200,000 patacas for private entities, are the same as those listed in the current version of the Tobacco Prevention and Control Law, which only covers a ban on the sale of e-cigarettes.
‘Easy first, difficult later’
Also addressing Friday’s press conference, SSM Director Alvis Lo Iek Long underlined that the local government has to carry out its tobacco control campaigns gradually, and in a way that measures which kind of implementation would be “easier” to be rolled out first, while those whose implementation would be “more difficult” could be rolled out later, a principle known as “easy first, difficult later” in the Chinese language.
Lo pledged that the government will continue to intensify its tobacco control campaigns with the ultimate aim of “creating a smoke-free Macau”.
Lo noted that while the percentage of teenagers aged between 13 and 15 smoking traditional tobacco decreased from 6.1 percent in 2015 to 3.8 percent last year, the percentage of those using e-cigarettes increased from 2.6 percent to four percent during the same period. The health chief described the situation as a “worrying” increase.
Consequently, Lo said, the government has drafted the amendment bill with the aim of minimising the use of “new kinds of tobacco products while they are still in their embryonic state”.
Health Bureau (SSM) Director Alvis Lo Iek Long address Friday’s Executive Council press conference at Government Headquarters. Photo courtesy of TDM
