Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what level of funding has been allocated to the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency to support enforcement actions related to the Tobacco and Related Products Regulations in (a) 2018, (b) 2019 and (c) 2020.

In October 2019, in light of the emerging suspected cases of e-cigarette or vaping associated lung injury in the United States, the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) requested data from 513 producers of nicotine containing e-liquid listed on the United Kingdom notified products list. The request was for information relating to any suspected respiratory adverse reaction in association with their products.

Overall 275 responses were received, covering approximately 72% of notified products. Seventeen producers confirmed they had received reports and provided data. This resulted in the addition of 125 cases of adverse respiratory reactions to the MHRA database of suspected adverse reaction reports to e-cigarette products.