EU stance softened: pragmatic shift in tobacco control policies

Core Insights:
The EU’s softening of its stance on its new nicotine product policy draft before COP11 is not a simple tactical adjustment, but a significant turning point in its tobacco control strategy from ideology driven to evidence-based. This subtle but crucial shift heralds a rift in the global tobacco control consensus towards a tough “exclusionary” approach, opening up critical political space for a risk-based regulatory model.
Driving factors:

1. Public opinion and pressure from member states: The pan European public consultation with over 13000 comments, especially from countries such as Sweden that have successfully reduced harm, has created enormous political pressure, forcing the EU to reassess its “one size fits all” tough policies.
2. The impact of real-world evidence: The experience and lessons of Denmark and other countries experiencing black markets due to taste bans, as well as cases of Japan, New Zealand and other countries successfully reducing smoking rates by promoting new products, make the purely ideological ban model untenable in practice.
3. Changes in the global regulatory environment: External key events, such as Juul products regaining marketing authorization from the US FDA, have provided important endorsement for the scientific and regulatory legality of new nicotine products, affecting the direction of policy debates within the EU.
4. Collapse of internal consensus: The new draft tacitly allows member states to have autonomy in specific regulatory measures (such as taste restrictions), which in itself acknowledges the lack of unified consensus within the EU on a hardline approach, thus opening the door to a more flexible and differentiated policy path.
   Key evidence:

• Fundamental adjustment of policy wording:
• The language describing non combustible products as “extremely harmful” in the old draft has been removed.
• The new draft explicitly mentions the need to refer to “proportionality, scientific evidence, emission data, and real-world impact analysis”.
• Delegation of regulatory authority:
• Taste restrictions are still possible, but they are no longer mandatory and are delegated to the discretion of the state. This is of great significance for countries such as Sweden that rely on specific products.
• The direct impact of public opinion:
• During the public consultation period, over 13000 comments were officially submitted – with Sweden’s participation being particularly high
• Recognizing the differences among member states:
• The EU’s text implicitly acknowledges that member states may not necessarily agree with its agenda and allows for different outcomes at the national level
  Strategic insights:
  The strategic significance of the EU’s position adjustment goes far beyond the COP11 conference itself. It marks the evolution of global public health policies from a rigid binary opposition of ‘quit smoking or die’ to a more mature and pragmatic risk management framework that acknowledges consumer choices, respects scientific evidence, and considers specific national circumstances. Although this does not represent a comprehensive victory for harm reduction advocates, it creates a crucial negotiation space for the future of global tobacco control policies, indicating that the focus of future policies will shift from “whether they should exist” to a rational game of “how to scientifically regulate”.