Sabine El-Chidiac is the Canadian Policy Associate at the Consumer Choice CenterMost Canadians have likely never heard of the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC,) a World Health Organization (WHO) treaty that is celebrating its twentieth anniversary this year. And yet, Canada not only signed and ratified this treaty, it has been beholden to its regulations for two decades. Canada is not alone, since 182 countries signed the treaty, covering around 90 percent of the world population. The regulatory hold that the FCTC has over Canadian smoking and harm reduction policy has sadly resulted in a rigid and anti-harm-reduction approach that is actively hurting Canadian smokers who are desperate to quit..The goals of the FCTC seem reasonable at first glance: smoking is bad for your health, and smokers having the resources they need to quit is essential to their ability to live a healthier life. The government of Canada reports that 3.8 million Canadians smoke, and helping them quit would be a huge achievement.However, the FCTC’s bureaucratic and uber-centralized model does not allow for the evolution of technology and innovation that actually helps with harm reduction for smokers.It also does not allow for the individualized local knowledge that each country has, when it comes to determining what might be the best policy for their population. Its obsession with abstinence and shaming smokers cannot possibly meet the goals they set for themselves..When Canada signed on to the FCTC, they got to work implementing it into law and regulation. While there is much to be said about the usefulness of the implemented rules regarding cigarettes, what is even more important is the way these rules have impacted a smoker’s ability to move away from smoking cigarettes in a way that makes it harder for them to quit. For example, Canada treats harm-reduction aids like e-cigarettes and heat-not-burn products like they are just as bad as cigarettes. By doing that, they are seriously harming the chances of a smoker to quit and live a healthier life. Rather than trumpet the usefulness of a product like e-cigarettes (better known as vaping products), which Public Health England has admitted are at least 95% less harmful than traditional cigarettes, Canada has built its regulatory system to line up with FCTC goals. Canada bans flavour names that they decide might be appealing to youth, and only allows factual ingredient names like “menthol.” Some provinces like Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island have gone as far as to ban all flavours for e-cigarettes. The problem here is that flavoured vaping products play a vital role in quitting smoking, with research showing they increase adult smoking cessation success rates by an astonishing 230%. The importance of flavours cannot be overstated. They are not simply marketing gimmicks or tools for youth appeal — as often misrepresented — but powerful behavioral aids for adult smokers seeking to break free from combustible tobacco. .By dismissing flavours wholesale, regulators may think they're protecting youth, but they’re actually condemning adult smokers to fewer options and higher relapse rates. This damaging policy is influenced by the FCTC’s Article 9/10 which encourages the regulation of the contents and disclosures of tobacco products, and Article 16 which supports policy that supposedly protects minors by reducing the appeal of a product. But beyond the science lies a deeper, more political problem: the FCTC’s overreach into national sovereignty. As currently structured, the FCTC acts less like a guiding treaty and more like a one-size-fits-all directive. Countries that tailor policies to suit their populations — like Japan with legalizing heat-not-burn products, and snus in Sweden — are often treated as outliers or even troublemakers by FCTC bureaucrats. It is impossible for such an insular and centralized organization to know what is best for smokers in Canada, or any other country, in particular. .A more Canada-focused approach can allow for the acceptance and even encouragement of innovation, like the invention of new heat-not-burn technologies which allow those looking to quit to ingest nicotine without 90-95% of the toxins and carcinogens found in cigarettes.This is a great step on the path to quitting, and yet Canada would never consider it while under the thumb and influence of the FCTC. In Japan, the cigarette market has halved in just over a decade, and went from 19.6% of their population smoking to just 10.8% from 2014 to 2023. In fact, one study shows that if half of Japan’s smokers switched from cigarettes to heat-not-burn, the health care savings alone would be the equivalent of more than C$4.3 billion. .In Sweden, the smoking rate is at 5%, something they achieved by embracing 'snus' (tobacco pouches) and nicotine pouches (nicotine pouches), which are 95% and 99% less harmful than cigarettes, respectively.Health policy is not, and should never be, a matter of ideological conformity. It should be data-driven, context-sensitive and ultimately accountable to national governments and their citizens.Countries like Japan and Sweden that have ignored the FCTC have actually been able to achieve what the FCTC cannot: less people smoking cigarettes.The imposition of blanket bans or rigid rules by international bodies undermines democratic governance and ignores cultural, economic, and scientific differences between countries. Canadian smokers who want to quit, deserve a flexible and innovation-forward approach that doesn’t have to conform to international bodies stuck in the past.Sabine El-Chidiac is the Canadian Policy Associate at the Consumer Choice Center.
