A prescription model for vapes: the way we ‘do’ medicines policy in Australia

Michelle Scollo; Claire Grace; Tanya Buchanan; Anita Dessaix

doi:10.1071/phrp34122405

RESEARCH ARTICLE (Open Access)

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A prescription model for vapes: the way we ‘do’ medicines policy in Australia

Michelle Scollo ^A , Claire Grace ^B , Tanya Buchanan ^C and Anita Dessaix ^D ^*

+ Author Affiliations

- Author Affiliations

^A Centre for Behavioural Research in Cancer, Cancer Council Victoria, Melbourne, Australia

^B Quit Victoria, Cancer Council Victoria, Melbourne, Australia

^C Cancer Council Australia, Sydney, NSW; University of Wollongong, NSW, Australia

^D Cancer Prevention and Advocacy Division, Cancer Council NSW, Sydney, Australia

^* Correspondence to: anita.dessaix@nswcc.org.au

Public Health Research and Practice 34, e34122405 https://doi.org/10.17061/phrp34122405

Published: 19 June 2024

2024 © Scollo et al. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International Licence, which allows others to redistribute, adapt and share this work non-commercially provided they attribute the work and any adapted version of it is distributed under the same Creative Commons licence terms.

Abstract

On 2 May 2023, the Australian Federal Government announced a suite of reforms aimed at ensuring the effectiveness of the prescription model of regulation of vaping (or e-cigarette) products in Australia. These reforms are intended to protect Australians, particularly young people, from the harms of vaping and nicotine dependence. The ensuing public debate on the issue has often created the impression that the options under consideration are to either retain ‘recently introduced’ prescription regulation or to ‘revert to’ a retail supply approach. However, the sale of nicotine vapes by retailers such as tobacconists and convenience stores has never been lawful in Australia. The reforms do not seek to change the way nicotine vaping products are regulated, but rather to ensure that the existing prescription model can be effectively enforced and can function as originally intended. This paper describes the historical context and rationale for strengthening prescription regulation of vapes in this country.

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