The UK government announced its plan to ban minors from buying e-cigarettes.

Electronic cigarettes, or e-cigarettes, are battery-powered devices that simulate the traditional cigarette smoking. It has a heating element that vaporizes flavored liquid solutions. These liquid solutions can sometimes contain a mixture of nicotine. In the U.K., around 1.3 million people smoke e-cigarettes.

Manufacturers of e-cigarettes claim that they are safe to use and aid smokers to quit the use of the traditional one. Though the vapor emitted by the e-cigarette is believed to be less harmful compared to the real cigarette and as effective as nicotine patches in helping smokers quit, many are still not convinced of its safety.

Prof. Dame Sally Davies, England's chief medical officer told BBC News, "We do not yet know the harm that e-cigarettes can cause to adults, let alone to children, but we do know they are not risk free."

E-cigarettes still puffs out toxic chemicals that could pose extreme dangers on the health on young ones.

Aside from banning its sales to minors, the ministers also plan to prohibit adults from buying traditional cigarette in behalf of minors. Once caught doing such, an adult will be paying a £50-fixed ($83) penalty notice or a fine of up to £2,500 ($4,131).

"We must do all we can to help children lead a healthy life," public health minister Jane Ellison said to BBC News.

Electronic Cigarette Industry Trade Association president Katherine Devlin said that she is open for changes. "It's high time that it was mandated in law so that it can be robustly enforced," she added, pointing out that product labelling made it clear e-cigarettes were not for under-18s,"she stated.

Another recommendation that the ministers are looking at is limiting the sales of cigarettes to the shops only. This is because most minors buy e-cigarettes from car boot sales and other unregistered places.