KENYA TOBACCO AND NICOTINE TAX COALITION (KTNTC) CALL FOR THE URGENT PASSAGE OF THE TOBACCO CONTROL (AMENDMENT) BILL (SENATE BILL NO. 35 OF 2024)

Nairobi, Kenya - We, the Kenya Tobacco and Nicotine Tax Coalition, have convened today to express our strong support for the Tobacco Control (Amendment) Bill (Senate Bill No. 35 of 2024) and to call upon the National Assembly to retain the strong regulatory measures proposed in the bill, adopt recommendations from the Tobacco Control stakeholders for enhancing the bill and urgently conclude the public participation process and forward the bill to the Senate for final consideration and passage

This Bill comes at a critical moment for Kenya.

Over the past decade, the tobacco and nicotine market has changed dramatically. Electronic cigarettes such as vapes, nicotine pouches, and other emerging nicotine products have entered the market faster than our laws have evolved to regulate them.

These products are increasingly being marketed through attractive flavours, colourful packaging, sleek designs, and misleading claims that make them appear modern, harmless, and socially acceptable.

The Tobacco Control (Amendment) Bill, 2024 seeks to close these regulatory loopholes by bringing emerging nicotine products under stronger regulation, restricting flavours that attract young people, strengthening health warnings, regulating product standards, and introducing additional protections for children and youth.

Yet as Parliament considers this important legislation, a campaign has emerged seeking to weaken, delay, or derail the Bill altogether.

This Bill is about protecting our children and youth from addiction. It is about closing dangerous loopholes that the tobacco and nicotine industry has exploited for years. It is about ensuring that Kenya remains a leader in tobacco control rather than allowing decades of public health progress to be reversed.

The question before Parliament is simple: Will we act now to protect the next generation, or will we allow the tobacco and nicotine industry to recruit the next generation of customers?

That is what is at stake!


For those who believe this threat is distant, recent events should serve as a powerful wake-up call.

The recent case involving a student at Moi High School Kabarak who was found in possession of a vape, exposed a reality that many Kenyans are only beginning to acknowledge.

While much of the public debate focused on disciplinary and legal questions, a far more important issue emerged. A learning institution found itself confronting a nicotine product specifically designed to evade detection.

This was not a conventional cigarette. It was a sleek, discreet nicotine product designed to be easy to conceal, easy to use, and appealing to young people.

The Moi High School Kabarak case should concern every parent, every teacher, every leader, and every policymaker in this country.

If these products have already found their way into our schools, then no school, no community, and no family should assume they are immune.

The Moi High School Kabarak incident is a warning sign. A warning that tobacco and emerging nicotine products such as vapes and nicotine pouches are finding new pathways into our schools, our homes, and the lives of our children.

And the warning signs do not stop there.

According to the National Authority for the Campaign Against Alcohol and Drug Abuse (NACADA)'s National Survey on the Status of Drugs and Substance Use in Kenya (2022), the minimum reported age of initiation for tobacco and nicotine product use in Kenya is just six years old. The 2024 Kenya Data on Youth and Tobacco (DaYTA) report shows the age of initiation is now five years for smokeless tobacco and roll your own and 6 years for nicotine pouches, cigarettes and shisha.

That means some Kenyan children are being exposed to tobacco and nicotine products before they are even old enough to complete primary school.

This should alarm all of us.

When children as young as five years old are being exposed to highly addictive nicotine products, this is no longer simply a tobacco control issue. It is a child protection issue. It is a public health issue. And it is a national development issue.

The threat is real and growing. Parliament must act with the urgency required to protect the next generation before this crisis becomes even worse.


Just days ago, the world observed World No Tobacco Day 2026 under the theme: "Unmasking the Appeal: Countering Tobacco and Nicotine Addiction."

This theme perfectly captures what Kenya is confronting today.

The tobacco and nicotine industry is no longer simply selling products. It is selling addiction masked in flavours
It is selling disease and death covered in attractive packaging

It is marketing an image that portrays nicotine addiction as fashionable, harmless, and part of a modern lifestyle.

Products are marketed in flavours such as mint and strawberry.

Some resemble flash disks, pens, highlighters, and everyday electronic devices.

These are not accidental design choices. They are deliberate strategies intended to attract new users, particularly young people.

The objective is clear: To make tobacco and nicotine addiction look appealing. To remove the fear associated with tobacco and nicotine use.
To normalize nicotine consumption.

And ultimately, to create lifelong customers.

This is exactly why the Tobacco Control (Amendment) Bill, 2024 is necessary.

It seeks to unmask these products for what they truly are: highly addictive products that require strong public health regulation.

Every year, tobacco kills about 12,000 people in Kenya.

In 2022, a study of 2,000 Kenyan patients receiving treatment for chronic respiratory disease, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, cancer, and tuberculosis found that nearly half - 46%, had a history of tobacco use.

The damage is not only measured in lives lost. For every US$1 earned from the tobacco industry, Kenya loses between US$2.20 and US$3.00 in healthcare costs and lost productivity.

The Tobacco Control (Amendment) Bill, 2024 is an opportunity to change this trajectory.


As Parliament considers this Bill, we are concerned by attempts to mislead the public and policymakers about what the Tobacco Control (Amendment) Bill, 2024 actually seeks to achieve. This Bill is about protecting children and youth from products deliberately designed to make tobacco and nicotine addiction attractive, acceptable, and easy to conceal.
Some have attempted to raise fears about illicit trade.

However, illicit trade is an enforcement issue and should never be used as an excuse to weaken public health protections. Kenya has ratified the Protocol to Eliminate Illicit Trade in Tobacco Products and efforts are being made to scale up enforcement.

Others are calling for delays.

But every delay benefits the tobacco and nicotine industry.

While discussions continue, new and emerging nicotine products continue finding their way into homes, schools and universities across Kenya. The health of our children and youth cannot wait.

Nicotine products are not harmless - they have been linked to increased risk of breast cancer, Cardiovascular diseases, Pulmonary diseases, Lung injury, Prediabetes, Metabolic syndrome and mental health problems. The adolescent brain is still developing until the age of 25 years - nicotine use is particularly harmful to young people as it interferes with the parts of the brain responsible for learning, attention, mood and impulse control.

Finally, some argue that emerging nicotine products should be exempted from stronger regulation because they are marketed as "harm-reduction" tools.

However, the reality we are witnessing is increasingly one of harm promotion rather than harm reduction. Across many countries, a growing number of young people who have never smoked a cigarette are being introduced to nicotine through flavoured vapes, nicotine pouches, and other emerging products. These products are creating a new generation of nicotine users rather than helping existing smokers quit.

The Kenyan data is illustrative - according to the 2022 National Survey on the Status of Tobacco Use in Kenya (TADSAS) Report, only 3.2% of adults aged 15-24 years use tobacco products, while the highest use of tobacco products is in adult males aged 45-54 years at 15%. However, only 2% of adult male smokers use e-cigarettes while 5.8% of university students use e-cigarettes. Clearly-cigarettes are being marketed to and used by non-smoking young people. If the purpose of thee-cigarettes was to help smokers quit, why are they deliberately designed to appeal to young people who don't smoke?

The World Health Organization has warned that e-cigarette use increases conventional cigarette use among non-smoking youth and that young people who use these products are significantly more likely to transition to cigarette smoking. The products are often designed and marketed in ways that appeal to young people through flavours, attractive packaging, concealability, and digital promotion.

A product cannot be described as reducing harm if it is simultaneously expanding nicotine addiction among children and young people.

Kenya must ensure that all nicotine products are regulated consistently and that no regulatory loopholes are left open for the tobacco and nicotine industry to exploit.


Kenyans deserve protection from addiction, Contrary to misinformation, the Tobacco Control (Amendment) Bill, 2024 introduces practical, reasonable, and evidence-based public health measures.

The Tobacco Control (Amendment) Bill will:

1.Regulate electronic cigarettes, nicotine pouches, and emerging nicotine products under the Tobacco Control Act.
2.Prohibit additives and characterising flavours such as fruit, spice, herbs, candy, etc. that make nicotine products attractive to children and young people.
3.Require child-resistant and tamper-proof nicotine products.
4.Limit nicotine concentrations in nicotine-containing liquids.
5.Prohibit disposable e-cigarettes, which are often the cheapest and most accessible products for young users.
6.Increase health warning requirements from 30 percent to 75 percent of the principal display area.
7.Extend pictorial health warnings to all tobacco and nicotine products.
8.Restrict sales of tobacco and nicotine products within 100 meters of facilities primarily serving children.

Globally, 121 countries regulate electronic cigarettes. Of these, 87 countries have adopted full or partial regulations for sale, marketing, and usage, while 34 countries implement outright bans on the sale of e-cigarettes In Africa, Ethiopia, Gambia, Mauritius, Seychelles and Uganda have banned them.

The measures proposed in the Tobacco Control Amendment Bill 2024 are not extreme. They are internationally recognized best practices designed to prevent addiction before it starts.


Today, we call upon the National Assembly to act decisively.

We call upon the Departmental Committee on Health to prioritize consideration of the Tobacco Control (Amendment) Bill, 2024 and reject attempts to weaken provisions relating to flavour bans, graphic health warnings, disposable e-cigarettes, nicotine concentration limits, child-resistant packaging, and protections for children and young people.

We call upon all Members of Parliament to support the Tobacco Control (Amendment) Bill, 2024 and to ensure its swift progression through Second Reading, Committee Stage, and Third Reading without unnecessary delay.

Every day that this Bill is delayed is another day the tobacco and nicotine industry has to recruit a new generation of users.

Members of Parliament must ask themselves a simple question: Who benefits from delay?

It is not parents.

It is not teachers.

It is not children.

It is not youth

It is definitely not public health.

Every delay benefits the tobacco and nicotine industry and comes at a cost to public health.

While action is postponed, the industry continues to expand its reach, recruit new users, and profit from addiction, while Kenyan families bear the health, social, and economic consequences.


The tobacco and nicotine industry is adapting faster than our laws. Our parliament now has both an opportunity and a responsibility to respond!

Years from now, Kenyans will not remember every speech made about this Bill. They will remember whether Parliament acted when the warning signs were impossible to ignore.

They will remember whether leaders chose to protect children from addiction or allowed industry interests to prevail.

The growing presence of e-cigarettes such as vapes and nicotine pouches in our schools is a warning. The reality that some Kenyan children are exposed to tobacco and nicotine products as young as six years old is a warning. The aggressive campaign against this Bill is a clear warning.

Every delay gives the tobacco and nicotine industry more time to recruit new users and grow its profits at the expense of public health.

Kenya has never shied away from bold action when the health and wellbeing of its people are at stake. This moment should be no different.

We call upon the National Assembly to fast-track and pass the Tobacco Control (Amendment) Bill, 2024 in its strongest possible form.

The health of our children and youth cannot wait. The protection of future generations cannot wait.

Parliament must act, and act swiftly.

ENDS-