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- Vitura Health (ASX:VIT) will start offering “smoking cessation” solutions
- In simpler language, Vitura will offer prescription-only vapes
- Canberra is moving to make vapes prescription-only in the nation with new laws in effect
- Vitura described the new laws as a “market opportunity”
- Shares last traded at 25 cents
Quickly responding to Canberra’s new laws that kicked off this month banning non-prescription vapes, ASX healthcare stock Vitura (ASX:VIT) has spied a “market opportunity”.
Let’s not make things cloudy: Vitura is gearing up to become a prescription vape provider.
Marketed as smoking cessation products, Vitura is adding prescription vapes to its online service platform CanView.
The move may not be surprising for a company that has shown no hesitation getting into the medicinal cannabis market, including providers of telehealth appointments that precede prescriptions – as well as the nebulous medicinal psychedelics field.
Vitura, for its part, was fairly honest in its assessment of rationale today.
“In support of the recent and planned changes by the TGA, which is aimed at making all NVPs available only via a medical prescription and dispensed only by a pharmacist, Vitura has added this new vertical to its product supply and distribution ecosystem, CanView,” the company wrote.
“The company has signed exclusive agreements with a number of leading suppliers who currently provide prescription-only NVPs to the Australian market which meet the TGA quality standards for supply to patients.”
Helping Vitura’s aspirations in the prescription vape market is something of a loophole embedded within the new Federal laws.
Doctors and nurse practitioners will be able to prescribe vapes without applying to the health regulator for pre-approvals when going through the ‘Special Access Scheme C Pathway.’
It appears that this pathway is what Vitura is targeting with a view towards vapes being prescribed for “smoking cessation or the management of nicotine dependence”.
Despite what could be a promising inroad to revenue generation, shareholders weren’t so sure today.
Vitura shares were in the red near 3 pm, down 1.96 per cent to 25 cents.
And overall, the stock appears to be moving contrary to the four ‘Buy’ ratings brokers have placed on Vitura.
One-year returns are down 57.26 per cent, and the stock underperformed the ASX200 by 63.4 per cent through 2023.
One month performance is also down 13.79 per cent. In late December, a third-party medicinal cannabis player notified Vitura it would not be extending its relationship with the company any further where regarding the latter’s flagship e-store platform.
Shares last traded at 25 cents.
