Poll: Should electronic cigarettes be banned indoors?

Electronic cigarettes should be banned from indoor spaces and face curbs on their sale over health fears, according to a long-awaited report.

Despite releasing vapour instead of smoke, the devices - officially known as electronic nicotine delivery systems (ENDS) - still carry a risk to bystanders, the World Health Organisation has said.

In the much-anticipated document, the UN health body voiced concern about the control of the £1.8 billion market by the traditional "Big Tobacco" giants.

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The report calls for tougher regulation and measures including a ban on the sale of the electrical devices to minors, warning they pose a "serious threat" to foetuses and youths.

It also says e-cigarette solutions with fruit, sweet-like and alcohol-based flavours, which may appeal to children, should be taken off the shelves and vending machines should be removed in almost all locations.

"The fact that ENDS exhaled aerosol contains on average lower levels of toxicants than the emissions from combusted tobacco does not mean that these levels are acceptable to involuntarily exposed bystanders," the report reads.

"In fact, exhaled aerosol is likely to increase above background levels the risk of disease to bystanders, especially in the case of some ENDS that produce toxicant levels in the range of that produced by some cigarettes."

The document, to be discussed at October's WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control in Moscow, also recommends preventing manufacturers from marketing e-cigs as "smoking cessation aids" until they provide scientific evidence to back the claim.

The report also says that they should be banned from sale to minors, and that vending machines should be removed "in almost all locations".

Electronic cigarettes are currently regulated as consumer products in the UK but from 2016 any nicotine-containing products (NCPs) which make medicinal claims - such as claiming they are a stop-smoking aid - will be regulated by the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency.

The World Health Organisation's findings come after a US report found electronic cigarettes may be more tempting to non-smoking young people than conventional cigarettes. It also found that once young people have tried e-cigarettes, they are more inclined to give regular cigarettes a try.

The report, released by a team at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, lends evidence to the argument that electronic cigarettes encourage youth smoking.

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