Australian government backs down on nicotine e-liquid import ban

The government in Australia has backed down from its latest attempt to ban the importation of nicotine e-liquid and nicotine e-cigs, keeping the TGA's personal importation scheme intact. This means e-cig users in the country can for now, continue to buy their vape products with nicotine in them from companies based overseas and import them into the country for personal use.

Australia doesn't have local vape shops that are allowed to sell nicotine e-cigs or nicotine e-liquids so they all sell nicotine-free products, but the country's vapers can still legally buy vape products from overseas with nicotine in them as long as they meet the requirements to do so and follow all of the rules that the TGA has set in place. While this has been the deal for Aussie vape users that want nicotine in their e-juice for years, the whole deal came pretty close to changing abruptly when the government proposed banning the personal importation of vaping products with nicotine in them.

The country's health minister made the initial proposal, which would have banned imports earlier this year. That plan was delayed and with the date moved up, a lot of Australian e-cig users were concerned that they were about to be cut off from nicotine e-liquid imports. Some wondered if they would go back to smoking cigarettes if they could no longer import e-liquid with nicotine in it. Then news broke that the government had backed down and the ban was no longer around the corner. It looks like regulations are coming but without a ban on personal imports, the e-cigarette users in Australia are currently able to continue buying everything they need to vape with nicotine from companies overseas.

A bit of commentary on this development:

Vaping should be easily accessible to smokers who want to quit smoking and making it more difficult for smokers, be it in Australia or elsewhere, to access vaping products. Public Health England has continually found vaping to be a lot safer than smoking so smokers who want to quit in places like the UK are actually being encouraged by the government to switch to vapes because they're less harmful. Australia is a different story these days and it looks like they almost took a turn in the wrong direction but have pumped the brakes and decided to move in what might be a more sensible direction.

Vapers in Australia, take a look at this pod vape. It's made by a company whose products are available to Australians and it comes in many flavors and can be purchased with nicotine or without it.