Menthol cigarettes banned in UK from next week

They will be removed from shelves on Wednesday (20 May 2020), despite tobacco companies failing to phase them out.

Instead they continued to sell and promote menthol products and to develop new products which circumvent the ban.

Under the new directive, flavoured rolling tobacco will be also be outlawed.

The University of Bath researchers behind the study argue this highlights how tobacco companies have exploited a delay in the ban to develop new products, keeping menthol products on the market for as long as possible, rather than phasing them out.

For the new study, the researchers from the Tobacco Control Research Group analysed industry analyst data to track menthol market cigarette share from legislation agreement through to 2018. They also analysed documentary evidence - industry documents, websites and retail publications - to understand tobacco industry activities.