India bans e-cigarettes as vaping backlash grows

NEW DELHI: India announced on Wednesday a ban on the sale of electronic cigarettes, as a backlash gathers pace worldwide about a technology promoted as less harmful than smoking tobacco.

The announcement by India came a day after New York became the second US state to ban flavoured e-cigarettes following a string of vaping-linked deaths. "The decision was made keeping in mind the impact that e-cigarettes have on the youth of today," Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman told reporters in New Delhi.

E-cigarettes heat up a liquid -- tasting of anything from bourbon to bubble gum or just tobacco, and which usually contains nicotine -- into vapour which is inhaled. The vapour is missing the estimated 7,000 chemicals in tobacco smoke but does contain a number of substances that could potentially be harmful.

They have been pushed by producers, and also by some governments including in Europe as a safer alternative -- and as a way to kick the habit. However critics say that apart from being potentially harmful in themselves, the flavours of some liquids have turned millions of children into vapers -- and potential future smokers.

The emergency legislation in New York, the second US state to ban flavoured e-cigarettes, followed a mysterious outbreak of severe pulmonary disease that has killed seven people and sickened hundreds.

President Donald Trump´s administration announced last week that it would soon ban flavoured e-cigarette products to stem a rising tide of youth users. Legislation is also being tightened elsewhere, and in Singapore e-cigarettes are already outlawed. In Japan, vaping and alternatives like "heat not burn" tobacco vaporisers are allowed but e-juices with nicotine are not.

China, home to almost a third of the world´s smokers, indicated in July that it wants the "supervision of electronic cigarettes" to be "severely strengthened".