Synergised Approach Across Agencies to Present Common Front Against Vaping

6 Mr Murali Pillai asked the Minister for Health having regard to the prevalence of vaping as a substitute for smoking and the potential for vaping and smoking activities to happen together, whether there is scope to consider synergising the enforcement capabilities of the Health Science Authority with the National Environment Agency to present a common front against vapers and those who are in breach of the prevailing regulations.

The Senior Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Health (Ms Rahayu Mahzam) (for the Minister for Health): Mr Speaker, the Ministry of Health (MOH) takes a multi-pronged approach to address the issue of vaping, including working with our partner agencies to strengthen enforcement measures and public education efforts.

The Health Sciences Authority (HSA) and National Environment Agency (NEA) are working together on a cross-enforcement pilot for NEA’s enforcement officers to also enforce against vaping offences.

Mr Murali Pillai (Bukit Batok): Mr Speaker, Sir, I am glad to note that the HSA and NEA are working together to deal with this problem. Having regard to the increasing rate of vapers – and as I understand between 2020 to 2022, it is four times more vapers being caught – is there sufficient enforcement bandwidth with HSA to make sure that we send a strong signal that those who breach the laws in dealing with vaping, action would be taken against them? And really, we want to stem the tide, so to speak.

Ms Rahayu Mahzam: I thank the Member for the question. Indeed, that is the main issue about making sure that there is meaningful enforcement, in light of the increasing rates that we are seeing. Part of the intent of the cross-enforcement pilot is to look into that and how we can synergise resources to be able to delegate the work and address the growing concern in the community.