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E-cigarettes will now be banned in smoke-free areas in Canberra and can no longer be sold to minors under new laws that came into effect on Monday. Advertising, displays and marketing of personal vaporisers, also known as e-cigarettes or vape pens, will also be heavily regulated and businesses selling them will now be required to have a tobacco licence. Under new laws that came into effect on Monday, e-cigarettes and any related products will face the same restrictions as tobacco products. Assistant health minister Meegan Fitzharris said the new restrictions brought the ACT into line with other jurisdictions like NSW and Queensland. "Emerging studies show that e-cigarettes can contain harmful chemicals, such as formaldehyde, damage DNA and may act as a gateway to nicotine addiction in children and young people," she said in a statement. "Restricting the use of e-cigarettes aims to protect public health, without constraining access to non-nicotine vaporisers by smokers wanting to quit." Heart Foundation ACT chief executive Tony Stubbs welcomed the tighter regulation of e-cigarettes in the ACT and said the organisation would like to see similar regulation nationally. "We consider this a positive step forward in safeguarding the health of ACT residents," he said. "The best thing you can do for your health is quit smoking and don't substitute tobacco with e-cigarettes. E-cigarettes currently on the market in Australia are totally untested and unregulated. "There isn't enough evidence to be sure that e-cigarettes are safe to use over long periods of time or whether they're useful to help someone quit smoking." The ACT has the country's lowest proportion of daily smokers at 13 per cent, according to the most recent Chief Health Officer's report. The report warned that e-cigarettes had become an emerging health issue and had the potential to "re-normalise smoking, especially amongst our youth". Ms Fitzharris said regulating e-cigarettes would protect the progress the ACT had made in the last few decades to discourage people from smoking and help stop it from being re-normalised again. For more information, visit health.act.gov.au.

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