The World Health Organization’s (WHO) “prohibitionist approach” to innovative nicotine products is unnecessarily costing the lives of smokers who could benefit from less harmful alternatives, according to public health advocates.
“The WHO dismisses adult smokers and vapers, even though adults bear the vast majority of tobacco-related harm. It’s odd to see the organization celebrate bans on products that aren’t even made from tobacco,” said Martin Cullip, a fellow at the Taxpayer’s Protection Alliance (TPA) and a prominent harm reduction advocate.
He made the remarks during an international webinar titled “How the WHO Undermines World No Tobacco Day,” adding that the WHO is “ignoring the populations most at risk.”
Panelists from the TPA criticized the WHO for rejecting harm reduction tools such as vapes, heated tobacco products and nicotine pouches, despite what they described as growing evidence of their effectiveness in helping smokers quit.
Participants from Australia, South Africa and the United Kingdom alleged that the WHO’s prohibitionist stance is counterproductive, exacerbating smoking-related deaths and fueling black markets.
The Nicotine Consumers Union of the Philippines (NCUP) echoed these sentiments, saying that alternative nicotine-delivery forms have helped millions of smokers quit.
“Tobacco harm reduction provides consumers with alternatives to smoking cigarettes, allowing them to choose products which are less harmful to them,” said NCUP president Anton Israel.
Israel said THR, as a public health strategy, is more effective than outright bans in reducing the adverse health effects associated with tobacco use, especially for individuals unwilling or unable to quit nicotine entirely. He explained that smoke-free alternatives to combustible cigarettes deliver nicotine with significantly reduced exposure to the toxicants found in tobacco smoke.
The TPA urged the WHO to “embrace innovation and engage with consumers” to address the global smoking crisis, asserting that tobacco harm reduction offers a more effective approach to helping smokers quit than outright prohibition. Panelists underscored the contradiction in the WHO’s mission, arguing that while claiming to reduce tobacco deaths, it continues to resist safer alternatives proven to help smokers quit.
The group called on the WHO and the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) to embrace innovation, listen to consumers and support harm reduction as a legitimate path to ending the global smoking epidemic.
Harm reduction advocates pointed to innovative products like vapes, heated tobacco and nicotine pouches, which they say have helped millions of smokers quit in countries such as Sweden and the United Kingdom.
Scientific studies, including those supported by the UK Health Security Agency and Office for Health Improvement and Disparities (formerly Public Health England), indicate that e-cigarettes are at least 95-percent less harmful than traditional cigarettes.
The National Health Service (NHS) in the UK claimed that while not risk-free, vaping is “far less harmful than smoking” and has helped thousands of smokers quit, calling nicotine vapes “one of the most effective stop smoking aids.”
The NHS has even begun trials providing e-cigarettes to smokers. It further clarifies that “while nicotine is a highly addictive drug, it does not contain toxic chemicals found in cigarettes, including tar and tobacco,” and that “it is the many other toxic chemicals contained in tobacco smoke that cause almost all the harm from smoking. Nicotine itself does not cause cancer, lung disease, heart disease or stroke and has been used safely for many years in medicines to help people stop smoking.”
Reem Ibrahim, communications manager at the UK’s Institute of Economic Affairs, said the WHO is “ignoring scientific evidence.” “Harm reduction works. These products help people quit. But the WHO’s strategy blocks access and ultimately harms public health,” Ibrahim said. He highlighted countries like the UK and Sweden that have embraced tobacco harm reduction.
Ibrahim noted that Sweden has reduced its smoking rates to below 5 percent, approaching what could be described as the smoke-free threshold. “They’ve been able to do so by allowing adults to choose safer and healthier, low-risk nicotine products, namely, snus which is culturally important in Sweden, and it’s effective in that way,” he said.
“This is entirely an antithesis to what the World Health Organization has advocated for,” he said.
Pippa Starr, founder of ALIVE (Australia, Let’s Improve Vaping Education), criticized the WHO’s unchanging rhetoric over the past decade. “About 11 or 12 years ago, they said in their statement that if we keep going as we are right now, we’re going to lose up to a billion lives this century,” Starr said. “Eleven or 12 years later, how much success have they had? Well, right as we stand, we’re on track to lose 1.2 billion lives this century.”
Starr cited Australia’s challenges, saying, “Australia has a massive black market and 66 people die daily from smoking-related disease. These outcomes are tied to WHO-endorsed policies. Rather than reward failed approaches, the WHO should be focused on saving lives.”
Kurt Yeo, an international harm reduction advocate and co-founder of VSML (Vaping Saved My Life), criticized the WHO’s perceived detachment from on-the-ground realities.
“WHO policies are scripted and disconnected. We need a full range of tools to achieve a smoke-free future. Prohibition has failed in countries like Mexico, India and Singapore. The WHO isn’t facing the real issues,” said Yeo.
“Our biggest challenge when it comes to ‘no tobacco’ is trying to find ways to help people quit smoking. And when you have a country like, for Africa, where we don’t have cessation support, we have an enormous illicit cigarette trade, and we have no real will to help people quit smoking. It just doesn’t fit,” said Yeo.
