Met dank overgenomen van Europese Commissie (EC), gepubliceerd op donderdag 20 mei 2021. Today, the European Commission published its first report on the Tobacco Products Directive, five years after it became applicable in 2016. Thanks to the Directive, the EU has witnessed steady decreases in smoking rates and tobacco use. However, more efforts are needed. The report points out two main areas where we need to see improvements: enforcement at national level and better consideration of new market developments, such as novel tobacco products. Stella Kyriakides, Commissioner for Health and Food Safety, said: “ With Europe's Beating Cancer Plan we are proposing bold and ambitious actions to reduce the use of tobacco. We have set a very clear objective - to create a tobacco-free generation in Europe, where less than 5% of people use tobacco by 2040. This means enforcing EU tobacco legislation more strictly and helping it keep pace with new developments. EU legislation on tobacco has clearly had a positive impact on smoking rates in the EU, but to meet our target, we must set our sights higher. The upcoming reviewing of the Tobacco Products Directive will be an important part of this work.”