Visits
The United States could demand to annul the provision, which generated a juicy smuggling market operated by criminal gangs that threaten the North American region.
Writing
Canton Group
Mexico City.- The review of the Commercial Agreement between Mexico, United States and Canada (TMEC), represents the opportunity to overthrow the “unprecedented and absurd” constitutional ban on vaporizers that came into force in 2025, by virtue of the fact that the Mexican government must standardize the regulatory framework for vaping to what applies in the other two commercial partners, where the devices are allowed, considered the civil organization México y el Mundo Vapeando.
The president of the institution, Juan José Cirión Lee, He said that in the American Union voices are emerging that fight for the issue of vaporizers to be within the work agenda of the review of the tripartite agreement, since the constitutional prohibition in Mexico strengthened organized crime by granting them the import, distribution and sale of the devices, which contrasts with the strategy of combating the cartels pushed by the US president. Donald Trump.
“I agree with that; if you want to seek protection at the borders, we cannot have a ‘black market’ in Mexico for items that are allowed on our three borders; vaping is legal in the United States, Belize and Guatemala; it is a terrible strategy to make a ban that lacks scientific basis and that all the surrounding countries have it allowed; smuggling is going to be favored in an impressive way, which is carried out by organized crime,” he commented.
Consulted from Geneva, Switzerland, where he is participating in a forum called Good COP 2.0, a parallel and counter-information event to the eleventh edition of the Conference of the Parties (COP11) of the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control of the World Health Organization (WHO), Cirión Lee recalled that Mexico’s relationship with Canada and, above all, with the United States, is not limited to trade issues, but also to issues such as migration, environment and security, which is why the decisions adopted in the region North America must be on the same page as its trading partners.
For this reason, he said that several specialists and leaders in the United States demand that Mexico support with facts the regional security strategy undertaken by Donald Trump, as should be the decriminalization of everyday consumer products, such as vaporizers, since it is absurd that on the side of the Mexican border there is a constitutional prohibition promoted by the authorities themselves that encourages a juicy smuggling market operated by criminal gangs, and on the US side actions are applied to combat precisely those criminal organizations.
The also Master of Law stated that even the forum in which he participates in Geneva, Switzerland, came the news that Mexico is the only country in the world that has banned vaporizers since the Political Constitution, while, in other regions, such as France and the United Kingdom, the devices are part of public health policies to combat smoking, since it has been scientifically proven that they are 95 percent less harmful than conventional cigarettes.
“Unfortunately in Mexico there is no criterion to use harm reduction as a tool to eradicate smoking; on the contrary, we know that Mexico has been characterized by completely distancing itself from scientific issues, it is a country that does everything ideologically and at the end of the road those who bear the brunt are all those who do not have options to find different alternatives and who have been totally abandoned by the government, while the government seeks awards and scholarships, smokers are totally abandoned in Mexico,” he commented.
In that sense, he warned that Mexico’s retrograde position responds, in large part, to the “philanthropic colonialism of the Bloomberg Foundation”, by virtue of the fact that “the Mexican authorities like to receive money from abroad in exchange for allowing the imposition of a type that wants to impose its ideology.”
In this regard, an investigation by journalist David Zaruk, published on the global independent journalism platform, “The Firebreak”, reveals that global public health policy is outlined by the American billionaire, Michael Bloomberg, who has “captured” the WHO, and which promotes and supports the magnate’s ideological positions, among which prohibitionist measures stand out, to the detriment of public debate and the freedoms of citizens.
The research maintains that the Bloomberg Foundation It capitalizes on at least 29 non-civil organizations in various countries, which promote policies aligned with the philosophy of the American magnate. The report emphasizes the serious influence that the businessman applies on the decisions adopted and promoted by the largest health regulatory body in the world, the WHO.
Along these lines, Juan José Cirión Lee deplored the Orchid award that the WHO gave to the Mexican delegation participating in COP11, headed by the Undersecretary of Health Policies and Population Wellbeing, Ramiro López Elizalde, for launching a call to form a united international front against smoking.
“Evidently the issue of Mexico has been relevant in the event, they made the outrage that while Mexico violates human rights, breaks the division of powers and takes away alternatives for smokers, it receives an award at the COP called ‘The Orchid Award’, which is for ‘the great effort’ that is supposedly made to combat smoking, while a country like New Zealand, which has incorporated vaping as part of its strategy to eradicate smoking, has been given The prize that is the dirty ashtray is the prize for the countries that go most against the WHO policies,” questioned the president of Mexico and the Vaping World.