Asia still holds most of the world’s smokers. Yet the region tends to be against the use of novel nicotine products, despite their proven effectivity to slash smoking and the harm associated with it. Why?
As numerous Asian countries move further towards restricting novel nicotine products, it becomes clearer that across Asia, the policy trend around products such as vapes, nicotine pouches and heated tobacco products, continues to lean toward prohibition rather than harm reduction. The region (with the exception of a couple of countries, such as Japan) tends to treat the products as a threat, not a tool to lower smoking harm and this unfortunate and a major global problem. Asia contains most of the world’s smokers, most of the world’s cigarette volume, and the fastest growing consumer base. If innovation is blocked here, the global harm reduction opportunity shrinks dramatically.
Why Asia defaults to bans
The interesting part is this: Asia is not anti-innovation in general. Asia leads the world in technology manufacturing, AI policy, electric mobility, biotech, fintech and digital public infrastructure. But nicotine sits in a different mental and political category. It is moralised. It is coded as something society “should not need.” In many Asian political cultures shaped by Confucian values or collectivist traditions (think the chewing gum ban in Singapore and the alcohol ban in the Maldives), legitimacy comes from protecting social order, not from allowing individual experimentation. So even if a product is much lower risk scientifically, the instinct is often to restrict it first and ask questions later.
There is also a bureaucratic alignment problem. In the UK, for example, vaping policy is managed mainly through smoking cessation, public health, behavioural science and health economics teams. In Asia, novel nicotine products are often handled by narcotics divisions, customs, interior ministries, police and anti-smuggling teams. Once the topic sits inside those structures, the default response becomes enforcement, not proportional public health regulation or switching incentive strategies. Harm reduction loses automatically just based on who “owns” the file inside government.
Politically, being strict also carries no cost. In Western democracies, politicians can eventually be punished for blocking innovation that saves lives. In Asia, political reward often comes from appearing tough, uncompromising and protective. Being hardline on nicotine reads as responsible leadership. This creates a very high friction environment for THR.
Asia’s quiet nicotine war
Recent developments across the region illustrate this pattern. In Thailand, authorities want to amend national tobacco control law to add strong new rules over vaping devices and new nicotine products. Officials cite a rapid rise in vaping among people over 15, driven mostly by online sales and bright, flavoured, youth-friendly packaging. Their solution is more enforcement, more coordination between ministries and tighter controls on supply chain. THR arguments do exist in Thailand — but they are currently coming from individual experts, not core government teams.
Cambodia recently issued a full ban on vapes and heated tobacco — covering import, sale, advertising and consumption. Multiple ministries have enforcement roles, in what is a total prohibition model. While Malaysia has proposed raising vape tax by 900%, making vapes more expensive than cigarettes. Local harm reduction organisations say this will remove switching incentives and simply push demand underground. Yet authorities still view vaping primarily through a youth risk lens, not as a safer alternative pathway.
Indonesia continues to tighten cigarette controls, calling for higher excise and banning single cigarette sales, yet has not meaningfully incorporated innovation-based harm reduction into its overall strategy. Meanwhile Indonesian experts such as Professor Tikki Pangestu publicly argue that warnings for safer products should not be identical to cigarette warnings, because risk is not identical.
The Philippines has banned open pod systems and uncertified e-liquids, which consumer groups say harms adult smokers who want to switch and gives illicit sellers more advantage. And the Maldives has gone further still, banning all tobacco for anyone born after 2007, alongside already existing vape bans.
If only science were to lead..
All of these examples show the same pattern: safer and more harmful products are frequently treated as if they are the same, despite major differences in risk profile. To change this direction, harm reduction in Asia needs better framing. Evidence alone does not move political culture. Asia changes rapidly when innovation is presented as state strength, not personal freedom.
Governments in Asia respond powerfully to arguments around modernisation of national health systems, sovereign safety, social stability and efficient reduction of disease burden. If safer nicotine can be framed this way, Asia can actually move faster than Europe or North America — because when Asian governments decide to scale a public health model, they can deploy systems and infrastructure extremely quickly.
We already have proof of this concept globally. Sweden for one, has shown that switching from smoking to low-risk nicotine can almost eliminate population cigarette use. The UK and New Zealand have demonstrated that active state use of vapes, can help adult smokers transition away from combustion at scale. And close to home, smoking rates in Japan have taken a serious hit thanks to the widespread use of heated tobacco products. With Asia copying what produces national stability and measurable population benefit, hopefully it is watching these models.
The important THR battleground nobody talks about
The future of global tobacco harm reduction may depend on this reframing. If Asian governments continue to treat safer nicotine products as narcotics, youth culture contamination or social disorder risk — then smoking rates will remain high, innovation will stall, and illicit markets will thrive.
If Asian governments instead were to view these products as modern, regulated medical industrial tools that reduce hospital burden and prevent premature death, the region could become the fastest harm reduction engine on earth. The science exists. The technology exists. What is missing is alignment between evidence and regional policy culture. That is the next work.