LAW ENFORCEMENT
Fake cigarettes seized ahead of menthol ban
Fake menthol tobacco products have been seized in the UK in the run up to the ban on the cigarettes in May 2020.
The European Union Revised Tobacco Products Directive (2014/40/EU) will make it an offence for manufacturers to produce menthol cigarettes and retailers to sell them from 20th May 2020.
The ban, which is already in force in countries such as Canada, is another vehicle to halting the take up of smoking among young people, the implication being that it is a ‘gateway’ cigarette to stronger tobacco products.
The total ban, which also applies to capsule, click on, click & roll, crushball or dual menthol cigarettes, but not to heated tobacco or e-cigarette products, has led to an increase in dangerous counterfeit products, experts claim.
There is no sell through period which means that retailers must have sold through any remaining stock of menthol cigarettes by the deadline.
The UK’s exit from the European Union does not impact the introduction of the menthol ban.
Anti-illicit trade operations manager at global tobacco brand JT Phil Carlton warned stores: “The risk is there and it will continue, there have been examples of counterfeit menthol products seized in the UK already.”
Charlton said Canada, which banned menthol tobacco products in 2017, had also experienced illicit sales in banned products driven by serious organised crime groups.
Likening the change to 1920s prohibition in the US, he commented: “When you ban a whole series of products, that’s when the concern comes that serious and organised crime fill that gap.”
With just over four weeks until the menthol ban, he said that now was the time to be educating customers about alternative legitimate products, and the dangers of buying from the black market.
He highlighted that ingredients such as asbestos and dead flies previously found in counterfeit products were likely to also be present in some fake menthol tobacco.
