Parliamentary committee inquiry into e-cigarettes

The House of Commons Science and Technology Committee chair, Norman Lamb, said he wanted the inquiry to find out what evidence is missing about the effects of e-cigarettes.

‘Almost three million people in the UK now use e-cigarettes, but there are still significant gaps in the research guiding their regulation and sale,’ he said. ‘They are seen by some as valuable tools that will reduce the number of people smoking “conventional” cigarettes, and seen by others as “re-normalising” smoking for the younger generation.’

This split opinion is reflected in different international approaches, with Public Health England estimating that e-cigarettes are far safer than tobacco, while the US surgeon general has referred to them as a ‘national public health concern’.