Buy casually on the "cigarette card" online? Tobacco control experts sue e-commerce platforms and businesses as parents.
Cut cigarette labels from cigarette boxes, fold them and make them into cards to play with — — At present, these "cigarette cards" used by children as toys are concerned by all walks of life because they are not conducive to the health of teenagers. Since March this year, Haikou, Sanya, Beijing and other cities have launched special rectification work. However, the reporter found that various "smoke cards" are still on sale on major e-commerce platforms.
On October 10th, the Beijing News reporter learned that the first case of protecting minors from the harm of "cigarette cards" had passed the filing review in Beijing Internet Court. Li Enze, deputy director and secretary-general of chinese association on tobacco control Public Welfare Law Committee and executive director of the Public Welfare Law Center of Beijing Yipai Law Firm, sued the e-commerce platform and the businesses selling "cigarette cards" together as a parent, and filed a lawsuit requesting that all the "cigarette cards" displayed and sold by the defendant be removed from the shelves according to law.
I hope that through litigation, the e-commerce platform will take the initiative to remove the "cigarette card"
This public interest litigation originated in March this year. Li Enze recalled that as an expert in tobacco control, many parents and teachers told him that their children were addicted to "cigarette cards", and he began to pay attention to and understand this matter. "My child is 9 years old this year, which also reflects that my classmates are playing and collecting cigarette cards. I often see some children sitting on the ground shooting ‘ Cigarette card ’ After research, it is found that ‘ Cigarette card ’ It not only infringes on the physical and mental health of minors, but also violates the regulations on the protection of minors. " Li Enze said.
To this end, through the investigation of parents, teachers and experts in tobacco control field, Li Enze summed up eight aspects that the "cigarette card" is harmful to the health of minors, including the formation of comparison among children and the influence on their studies; Premature contact with cigarettes due to "cigarette card"; There are secondary hazards such as digging out trash cans, stealing cigarettes and gambling in disguise due to the collection of "cigarette cards". With the popularity of "cigarette cards" among children, the phenomenon of making and selling "cigarette cards" has also been born. Li Enze said that he had sent a letter of advice on rectifying the "cigarette card" to National Health Commission and the State Administration of Market Supervision, and received a positive reply, saying that supervision would be strengthened.
According to public reports, in May this year, the Office of the State Tobacco Monopoly Bureau issued the "Notice on Carrying out Special Treatment to Protect Minors from E-cigarettes", requiring local tobacco monopoly bureaus to cooperate with market supervision and other departments to dissuade convenience stores, supermarkets, cultural and sports goods stores around the campus from selling cigarette cases, "cigarette cards" and other items to minors. Beijing, Shanghai, Zhejiang, Guangdong, Shenzhen and other places should tighten the responsibility of territorial supervision, adopt administrative interviews and send supervision letters, etc., and require local Internet companies to independently clean up product information such as e-cigarettes and "cigarette cards" and shut down illegally sold shops.
However, Li Enze found that there are still "cigarette cards" for sale online. According to statistics, there are more than 7,000 shops selling "cigarette cards" on one large e-commerce platform. He also bought "cigarette cards" from many shops online, and found that some of them were made of real cigarette cases, while others were privately printed paper products (not made of real cigarette packaging). He then decided to file a public interest lawsuit against a large e-commerce platform and merchants selling "cigarette cards". "I hope that through this lawsuit, the court will confirm online sales according to law ‘ Cigarette card ’ The behavior is illegal, and the responsibilities of all parties are clear. The purpose is to make the e-commerce platform take the initiative to remove the ‘ Cigarette card ’ So that all sectors of society can pay attention to the protection of minors. " Li Enze said.
Many e-commerce platforms have "smoke cards" for sale, and merchants use "smoke smell" as a gimmick.
The Beijing News reporter found that at present, searching for the word "cigarette card" on many e-commerce platforms will pop up keywords such as "cigarette card collection book", "cigarette card", "cigarette card box" and "cigarette card", and a large number of merchants selling cigarette cards will appear when they click in. Some merchants display "the whole network sells 100,000+". Searching for "cigarette cards" on an e-commerce platform will pop up the page of "Green Network Plan (Anti-smoking Publicity)", but searching for keywords such as "100 cigarette cards sent by cigarette card storage box", "genuine cigarette cards" and "rare cigarette cards" can still jump to the page of merchants selling "cigarette cards".
These businesses all sell cigarette cards stacked with various brands of cigarettes, and claim that they are "100% genuine" and "smell of cigarettes", etc. Some businesses take "children no longer need to pick up trash cans", "clean and hygienic" and "parents buy them for their children" as propaganda words, and many businesses will use "rare cards", "foreign out of print" and "China (cigarette brands).
The Beijing News reporter randomly asked the sellers of the two e-commerce platforms that the "cigarette cards" sold were clean and hygienic, and they were made of genuine cigarette boxes. An online shop customer service introduced that some of these cigarette cards were made from defective boxes before loading cigarettes, and some were made from cigarette cases recycled by waste stations. "Recycling has to go through several rounds of disinfection to ensure hygiene and cleanliness." Another online shop clerk who claimed that "it smells like smoke and has glue marks" said that the "cigarette card" came from the box recycled by the tobacco and alcohol wholesale store and was "disinfected".
When the reporter searched for "cigarette card" on a lifestyle sharing network platform, he found that there were sharing contents such as the course of overlapping cards and the introduction of segment classification, including the overlapping method of gold, silver, silver and copper, and the new folding method of "ghost card".
This year, many places have rectified the sales of "cigarette cards"
The core issue of this public interest litigation is whether the "cigarette card" can be sold online. Li Enze believes that this violates the relevant legal provisions of the Law on the Protection of Minors in People’s Republic of China (PRC), the Advertising Law in People’s Republic of China (PRC), the Tobacco Monopoly Law in People’s Republic of China (PRC) and the Regulations for the Implementation of the Tobacco Monopoly Law in People’s Republic of China (PRC). Among them, according to Articles 4, 50, 51 and 53 of the Insurance Law, the production, display and sale of "cigarette cards" are suspected of inducing minors to buy and use them, infringing on their physical and mental health.
According to the advertising law, advertisements must not harm the physical and mental health of minors, and it is even more forbidden to publish tobacco advertisements in the mass media or public places, public transport and outdoors. It is forbidden to send any form of tobacco advertisements to minors. According to the tobacco monopoly law and the regulations for the implementation of the tobacco monopoly law, the trademark marks of tobacco products must be printed by enterprises designated by the provincial administrative department for industry and commerce; Non-designated enterprises shall not print trademark marks of tobacco products; No unit or individual may sell illegally produced tobacco products. According to this, Li Enze filed a lawsuit, demanding that the defendant be ordered to pay compensation and apologize publicly according to law, and all the "cigarette cards" displayed and sold should be removed from the shelves, and they should not continue to be sold and displayed.
According to public reports, the reporter noticed that as early as March this year, Haikou, Sanya, Beijing and other cities have launched special rectification work on "cigarette cards", and many provincial and municipal market supervision and management departments have clearly prohibited the sale of "cigarette cards". For example, in September this year, Changzheng Street Market Supervision Office in Pingchuan District, Baiyin City, Gansu Province launched a special rectification campaign for "cigarette cards" around the campus, requiring merchants to post a warning sign prohibiting the sale of cigarettes to minors and not selling "cigarette cards" to minors in a prominent position, and confiscated more than 200 illegal "cigarette cards" according to law; In mid-July, Guizhou Provincial Market Supervision Bureau concentrated on the unified illegal action of rectifying "cigarette cards" and found out the illegal act of selling "cigarette cards" and cigarettes to minors … …
On June 30th, Beijing Tobacco Control Association issued a document saying that "cigarette card" is the carrier of tobacco information in disguised form, and premature exposure of primary school students to tobacco trademarks may lead to psychological hints of trying to smoke. In addition, in order to get a "cigarette card", some students look for discarded cigarette cases on the roadside, and even rummage through cigarette cases in the trash can, and their hands are easily contaminated by bacteria. The association suggested that "cigarette cards" should be supervised and managed.
"In a broad sense, public interest litigation is all litigation that can promote the protection of public interests. In a narrow sense, it includes public interest litigation clearly stipulated by law, such as ecological environmental protection and administrative public interest litigation." Li Enze expressed the hope that through this lawsuit, he would appeal to the society to pay attention to and supervise the display and sale of "cigarette cards" on e-commerce platforms and work together to protect minors.