Court ruling: E-cigarettes allowed to remain in Restaurants – Business Week

Who evaporated, does not smoke: This view represents the Higher Administrative Court of North Rhine-Westphalia – and allowed the controversial e-cigarette in restaurants.

Supporters of E-cigarettes have won a victory in court: Owners may continue to allow their guests the consumption of electric cigarettes – at least in North Rhine-Westphalia. The strict Non smoking protection of the law’s most populous state did not apply to the evaporator, the Higher Administrative Court (OVG) in Münster ruled on Tuesday.

Because to be burned at e-cigarettes no tobacco, if it were not for smoking, argued the judge. In addition, the risk to third parties is not comparable with those of the harmful cigarettes Qualms (Az .: 4 A 775/14).

are facts tobacco consumption

• percentage of smokers

  Almost smoke 30 percent of Germans 18-79 years. Between the sexes, there are differences: 33 percent of men and 27 percent of women resort to cigarette and Co

  . Source: dpa

• The higher the social status, “> Who smokes

• per capita consumption

  996 cigarettes , the average per capita consumption in 2013 – a decline of 1.2 percent compared to 2012th In 2000, the Germans still had 1,699 cigarettes per capita consumed. The total consumption was in 2013 at 80.3 billion. . There were nearly 3.6 billion cigars and cigarillos

• death

  Up to 120,000 die in Germany each year from more than 3000 passive smoking. . EU die every year nearly 700,000 smoking

• spending for cigarettes

  Good 24.3 billion euros gave the Germans from last year for tobacco products.
  

• tobacco

  The revenue from the tobacco tax were 2013 in 14.1 billion euros . This makes it is after the energy tax (39.4 billion euros) the zweitergiebigste of taxes.

• advertising spending

  Round 200 million Euro invests the tobacco industry in the advertisement.

The plaintiff was a bar owner in Cologne, in the restaurant, where guests can access the E-cigarette. Then the city he had threatened disciplinary measures. The host had already quite get in the first instance by the Cologne Regional Court. The Higher Administrative Court dismissed the appeal of the city of Cologne.

The judgment obliges but does not host, allow the use of e-cigarettes in his restaurant, said the North Rhine-Westphalian Ministry of Health. In the framework of the property rights owners could continue to ban e-cigarettes from their premises.

Questions and Answers for E-cigarette

• What is the principle of e-cigarette ?

  With each train a focal element liquid nicotine vaporized. To create the illusion allow work perfectly, glows a LED at the tip.

• Make E-cigarettes less addictive?

  Scientific evidence does not exist. What is certain is that nicotine is addictive. The electric tilting are poorly understood, effects of potential pollutants unknown, critics say. It is also unclear what is added to the concentrate. The only know the manufacturer. Requests remain unanswered with reference on trade secret. The US-FDA inspection authority. 2009 found toxic substances in samples – including carcinogenic nitrosamines. For a high quality of E-cigarettes also speak of varying nicotine content in the capsules. Even as nicotine declared cartridges exhibited the addictive substance.

• Can an E- cigarette smoke everywhere

  authorities, researchers and politicians warn of potential health hazards – both for the E-steamers, as well as the passive absorber. You want to make the ban on smoking zones also to vapor-free zones.

• How big is the feed to the e-cigarette?

  In September 2011, already 1.2 million people in Germany complete or partial e-steamer. Sales in Germany in 2011 was about 100 million euros. Today, only three months later, the Association founded a few weeks ago the eZigarettenhandels (VDEh) estimates already two million e-cigarette users.

The Higher Administrative Court disagreed with the judgment of the opinion of the Federal Government, the State Health Department and the City of Cologne. They were so far assumed that a fixed written in the law of general smoking ban also applies to e-cigarettes. With the intensification of the Non smoking Protection Act 2012 in North Rhine-Westphalia, the legislature did indeed want to include e-cigarettes, the wording of the law but not amended accordingly, rebuked the OVG.

The judge complained also that the dangerousness of the e-cigarette so far “not been adequately researched, let alone evidence” for “passive steamer” was. Possible risk of e-cigarettes are in any event “neither identical nor comparable.”

The health dangers of e-cigarettes are controversial. The Federal Institute for Risk Assessment includes risk to third parties is not enough.

An appeal against the final judgment not yet left the court. The city of Cologne, however, has the option to appeal to the Federal Administrative Court. The North Rhine-Westphalian Ministry of Health announced its intention to evaluate the judgment alone. “If the judgment have stock, we would then – if possible together with the federal government – search for suitable solutions for the health especially of children and young people,” it said in a statement

.