Iceland's Office of Health Promotion and the Science Office are consulting on a draft law on nicotine products that, if approved, would introduce age limits for nicotine consumption, ban e-cigarette flavors deemed attractive to children, and set maximum permissible concentrations of nicotine.
Currently, the minimum age for buying e-cigarettes in Iceland is 18, and the proposed bill would impose the same age limit on other nicotine products.
Iceland's current adult smoking rate of 7% is the lowest in Europe apart from Sweden.
According to Filter, perceptions have been distorted by the misconception that nicotine consumption and smoking go hand in hand. "Nicotine is not the cause of death from smoking," Yorkshire Cancer Research UK said. "Nicotine is not a carcinogen; There is no evidence that continuous nicotine use alone increases the risk of cancer. Of the three leading causes of death from smoking (lung cancer, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and cardiovascular disease), none is caused by nicotine. The harm from smoking comes from thousands of other chemicals in tobacco smoke."