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Dear Editor, We read with great interest that the Journal of Epidemiology has recently decided not to consider for publication manuscripts on research carried out with funding from the tobacco industry. 1 We strongly support such a decision. Until now, we have seen a lot of studies conducted by the tobacco industry, which are likely to be biased due to conflicts of interest. New tobacco products are not exempt from this phenomenon. 2 Indeed, most of the knowledge on heat-not-burn tobacco products (HNB) comes from the tobacco industry. 3, 4

HNBs are hybrids between electronic and conventional cigarettes: on one hand, they are equipped with a device that heats the product, without reaching combustion, to generate aerosol (ie, a sort of “cold smoke”); on the other hand, the product used is not a liquid containing nicotine, but “real” tobacco. 4, 5 IQOS is the brand name of such a product by Philip Morris International (PMI). IQOS has pioneered the HNB market since December 2014, after having been launched in test markets in Milan (Italy) and Nagoya (Japan). To date, it is in commerce in 30 countries, including 22 from the WHO European region. 4, 6 In Italy, IQOS expanded the market to the whole country since December 2015, and, until December 2017, it was the only available HNB. We provide, hereby, independent data on sales of HNBs in Italy.