Overview

• France's Minister of Health and Prevention, Aurélien Rousseau, announced a plan to ban smoking on the country's beaches, parks, forests, and near schools, aiming to avoid 75,000 deaths per year.
• The French government will also raise taxes on cigarettes and move to ban single-use disposable e-cigarettes.
• The Australian government will ban imports of disposable vapes starting in January, in an attempt to cut down on the increase in vaping among young people.
• British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak introduced a proposal to raise the smoking age in the United Kingdom by one year every year until no one would be legally able to buy tobacco.
• Hong Kong Health Minister Lo Chung-mau earlier this year solicited public opinion on proposals that could raise import taxes on cigarettes, raise the smoking age, and ban alternative smoking products.