Disposable vapes ban 'has only created a drugs-like black market'

Experts warn warehouses full of millions of illicit e-cigs

- By Paul Jeeves Crime Editor

WHEN disposable vapes were outlawed last summer the hope was to clean up both the nation’s streets and its lungs.

But far from vanishing they are pouring through the black market with drug-style operations run by serious organised crime gangs.

Some 1.19 million illegal vapes were seized by Trading Standards in the past year, taking the total to more than six million in three years. And warehouses are stacked with tens of millions of banned single-use devices.