Hong Kong authorities have issued four HK$3,000 (US$382) fines in the first two days of an expanded ban on alternative smoking products, while assuring the public that inspectors will not conduct arbitrary body searches to enforce the law.

Manny Lam Man-chung, head of the Tobacco and Alcohol Control Office, said authorities stepped up enforcement and public education efforts in commercial districts since the ban on alternative smoking products – including e-cigarettes, heated tobacco products and herbal cigarettes – was expanded to include public use from Thursday.

As of 5pm on Friday, inspectors conducted 216 checks and handed out four HK$3,000 fixed penalty tickets targeting the possession or use of such products, including vapes, Lam said. Another 21 tickets were issued for standard illegal smoking offences.

During a radio interview on Saturday, Lam addressed public concerns, clarifying that enforcement actions were taken based on reasonable suspicion.

“The law grants our inspectors the power to … search, prosecute, and seize evidence, but these powers are only used during enforcement,” Lam said.

“We will only exercise these search powers when there is reasonable suspicion. In other words, we will not [randomly] search people’s bodies to see if they possess these alternative smoking products.”

Lam said the inspectors were fully trained to identify the products and would target previous hotspots for illicit smoking.