Proof that Higher Taxes on E-cigarettes Will Harm

When the Italian government added increased taxes to E-cigarettes including the liquids, batteries and accessories, which effectively doubled their price, we had an opportunity to observe the effect in terms of the number of users. These fell by half to 255,000 from almost half a million in 2013 in Italy, whilst globally the numbers have grown. Since nearly all users of e-cigs are in the first place smokers, the impact on public health can only be overwhelmingly negative, as top health scientists have warned.

These taxes were not even as high as for tobacco, and the EU has recently proposed hitting e-cig users with the same taxes as tobacco.