The Senate on Monday adopted an unnumbered decision denouncing the sale and advertising of e-cigarettes and different vape merchandise in direction of the youth.
This developed after Senator Pia Cayetano delivered a privileged speech on vape flavors and designs which draw younger individuals to the merchandise.
Cayetano criticized anew the Vape Law, which she stated eliminated the availability of the Sin Tax Law that solely tobacco and plain menthol flavors have been allowed.
She introduced images of vape which confirmed fruit flavors comparable to melon, blueberry, and mango.
Another set of images confirmed cartoon characters and sweet manufacturers getting used as labels for vape sticks.
Cayetano cited Section 12 of the Vape Law which gives, “The sale of vaporized nicotine and non-nicotine products and novel tobacco products that are packaged, labeled, presented, or marketed with flavor descriptors that are proven to unduly appeal particularly to minors shall be prohibited.”
“A flavor descriptor is presumed to unduly appeal to minors if it includes a reference to a fruit, candy brand, dessert, or cartoon character,” the provision said.
“These are the flavors now. Hindi ba direct violation yan..? What are these others? It’s a freaking skateboard. Sino ba nagse-skateboard na may edad? There are a few actually. But predominantly, skateboarders are young people,” Cayetano stated.
“I cannot control the behavior of adults, but it is still our job when we legislate that we don’t allow these products to be marketed indiscriminately to make it appear as if it is safer. And now, we can see evidence that they are really targeting the youth,” she added.
Senate President Juan Miguel Zubiri floated the thought of passing an unnumbered decision to sentence this advertising observe and “implore” the Department of Trade Industry to implement the regulation to the letter.
It was supported by Senate Majority Leader Joel Villanueva, Senate Minority Leader Aquilino “Koko” Pimentel III and Senator Jinggoy Estrada.
“Frankly, I’m quite disappointed… because you know, DTI also has the wherewithal…to regulate the industry and this is what is happening here,” Pimentel stated.
“We are really disappointed because we put our trust in them. Sabi nila kaya nila. I hope that they will be able to explain what’s happening during the committee hearing,” he added.
Before the aproval of the unnumbered decision, all of the senators have been named co-authors.
Once the decision was ready, the Senate secretariat was directed to furnish copies of this to the DTI and different involved authorities companies. —NB, GMA Integrated News
Source: www.gmanetwork.com
