Fruit flavored Smoke Banned for Half a Month, the Flavor "Filter" Sales hot Results in Controversy

On October 1, 2022, the Chinese national standard for electronic cigarettes officially began to implement. The national standard clearly, in view of the fruit, food, drinks and other flavored e-cigarettes and smokeless alkali e-cigarettes have a strong appeal to minors, easy to induce minors to smoke, so the provisions should not make the product features flavor other than tobacco flavor, meaning that fruit flavored bong had to exit the history stage.

Now the national standard has been implemented for nearly half a month, the country's major e-cigarette stores have also been off the shelves of fruit-flavored bombs. However, there is another kind of flavor filter that can be used with e-cigarettes to enrich the flavor of e-cigarettes, and many brands have also launched related products. There is a lot of controversy over whether these flavor filters are legal and compliant.

The principle of these filters called "flavor stick" and "fruit stick" is similar, all of them are on top of the GB e-cigarette cartridge to add a filter stick, so that the smoke is filtered through the filter stick, giving the GB tobacco flavor e-cigarette smoke fruit flavor, cool flavor effect.

Some e-cigarette consumers described, "plus (flavor filter) after the fruit flavor of the smoke bomb, although not as good as before, but than simply smoking tobacco flavor experience will be better." The reporter found during the visit, some flavor filter brand even in the publicity only word not to mention the "taste", but to emphasize the "health, safety" and other key words, mainly to promote the flavor filter on the oil, particulate matter filtration role.

In this regard, some brands told reporters: "We try to keep a low profile at this stage, the topic is very sensitive, facing mixed reviews, the industry is also currently studying related issues."

Why the industry on the "taste filter" taboo? Some industry insiders said that the risk point of the flavor filter is whether it will be regarded as a "class of tobacco products", once defined as such, the next likely outcome is to be banned. In addition, from the perspective of the spirit of regulation, practitioners are generally concerned that it will be judged as a "counter-policy products", and the product has not been in the public eye, has not yet figured out the market's attitude toward the product, and therefore very cautious.

Reporter investigation has learned that the taste of the market filters are mainly the following two kinds: one for the addition of popping beads in the flavor filter. Flavor release principle is the same as the burst beads cigarette, the user will be in the filter before smoking electronic cigarette burst beads can be pinched; one is the newly emerged plant particles filter. The structure of the filter is the head and tail is the filter cotton, hollow part of the filling plant particles, electronic smoke through the filter will be attached to the flavor of the particles, so as to achieve the effect of increasing the taste.

So the flavor filter in the end is legal compliance?

In this regard, an unnamed brand told reporters that the current filter products do not contain nicotine, the second will not produce aerosols, three is not through the heating of smoke, but only to play the role of filtration, similar to the cigarette filter. From the point of view of production technology, but also "manual work", there is no technical content, so there is no need to use the control of auxiliary materials and equipment, that is, not touching the policy red line.

Zhang Lan praseodymium, a practicing lawyer at Beijing Dadi Law Firm, pointed out that even though the flavor of the mouthpiece stick does not heat and release nicotine, it is an auxiliary appliance of the same kind of finished cigarettes as the popping beads, and is dominated by the finished cigarettes, which lose their main value and purpose of research and development, and cannot exist independently, and is personally considered an "inseparable object" of the finished cigarettes.

A flavor filter head brand in an interview with reporters pointed out that the flavor filter has always existed, before the e-cigarette has not come into the public eye, it is widely used in cigarettes, as a cigarette seasoning auxiliary is also allowed, in the e-commerce platform has always been sold seasoning filter, the flavor filter is not a product of the fire after the e-cigarette, it can not be strongly linked to the regulation of electronic cigarettes. It cannot be strongly linked to the regulation of e-cigarettes.