Consumers of Safer Nicotine Products

Looking at the Eurobarometer 2017 Findings by Country in More Detail

- No Fire, No Smoke: The Global State of Tobacco Harm Reduction

The key findings were that across the 28 countries of the EU in 2017:

Around 15 percent of those aged 15 or over had tried an e-cigarette at least once – compared to 12 percent in 2014;
Two percent of the population are current users and this has remained stable since 2014;
Almost one in twenty current smokers now currently use e-cigarettes or similar devices (four percent), and four percent of ex-smokers;
Current use of e-cigarettes among people who have never smoked is rare. At most, one percent of e-cigarette users in any EU country are people who have never smoked

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Time to Switch?

- No Fire, No Smoke: The Global State of Tobacco Harm Reduction

The Time to Switch poster went viral round the world within a couple of hours of appearing on billboards in Leicester. The call to action on the poster was that all smokers should consider switching to vaping, and that vapers should consider quitting smoking altogether.

Also see p. 54 of the report: No Fire, No Smoke: The Global State of Tobacco Harm Reduction 2018 — Global State of Tobacco Harm Reduction (gsthr.org)

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Estimated Numbers of People Using Vapour Products (E-cigarettes and Heat-not-Burn) Globally (Millions)

- No Fire, No Smoke: The Global State of Tobacco Harm Reduction

According to the market analyst company Euromonitor, in 2011 there were an estimated seven million people who “were regular dual or sole users of e-cigarettes and vapour products” around the world – for this estimate Euromonitor combines data on e-cigarettes and HNB. That figure rose to around 35 million in 2016 and is estimated to rise to around 55 million by 2021. Euromonitor base their growth estimate of 55 million partly on the assumption that the market in HNB products will continue at the current rate, although there are signs that the rapid growth in the Japanese market is beginning to slow. Much caution is required in forecasting what will happen in the SNP market because of the uncertainties over both regulation and consumer uptake.

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Comparison of Current Smoking and Vaping Levels

- No Fire, No Smoke: The Global State of Tobacco Harm Reduction

Data shows the prevalence of smoking cigarettes compared with the prevalence of e-cigarette use across the EU.

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Ratio of Current Vapers to Current Smokers

- No Fire, No Smoke: The Global State of Tobacco Harm Reduction

A simple metric giving the ratio of current e-cigarette users to current smokers. This shows that the highest is the UK at 0.29. In other words, there are 29 e-cigarette users for every hundred smokers in the UK. In many other EU countries, the ratio is above 0.10.

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Top Four Reasons for Starting to Use E-Cigarettes

- No Fire, No Smoke: The Global State of Tobacco Harm Reduction

Eurobarometer also gives insights into why people use e-cigarettes. It might seem obvious but the top reason across the EU for using e-cigarettes is to stop using tobacco. The clear majority of people using e-cigarettes did so to stop, or to reduce tobacco use (61 percent). Following this the next reason was because they thought e-cigarettes were less harmful than cigarettes (31 percent), or less expensive (25 percent). Only six percent said they started because they felt using e-cigarettes was cool or attractive.

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