Despite 8 million annual smoking-related deaths, the World Health Organization (WHO) seems to have decided that it doesn’t have to deal with safer nicotine alternatives until 2023.
On August 5, the WHO’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) released an annotated provisional agenda for COP9—its upcoming, virtual conference of the 182 parties that make up the convention. COP is held every two years.
“The Bureau decided that the reports prepared by WHO (Comprehensive report on research and evidence on novel and emerging tobacco products, contained in document FCTC/COP/9/9) and by the Convention Secretariat (Challenges posed by and classification of novel and emerging tobacco products, contained in document FCTC/COP/9/10), should be presented for information and that related substantive discussions should be deferred to COP10 [in 2023],” the provisional agenda reads (emphasis my own).
Alex Norcia – FilterMag – 2021-08-06.