Help stop uptake of deadly drug
WE support the proposed legislation to raise the age of cigarette sales to 21 years, now known as T21.
As has occurred in the US and been widely reported, raising the tobacco sales age to 21 years is very effective in reducing the uptake rates of smoking, and deters young people from taking it up.
We spend energy and money trying to help people quit, and we must continue to do this. However, we also have to look at the supply side, those who are “pushing” these drugs.
It is the tobacco manufacturers and retailers who are selling these products, and they know that young people are their target market. We have a ruthless tobacco industry still targeting young people with flavoured menthol cigarettes and now they want to get kids addicted to ecigarettes.
It is unacceptable that retailers’ peak organisations, partnered with big tobacco, are urging politicians to reject T21, and instead legalise another recreational drug, e-cigarettes. This drug delivery device is unregulated and responsible for lung injuries and death of users.
E-cigarettes or vaping products with nicotine are not available in Australia yet they are available on the internet and in some less reputable shops.
We know that many people are vaping under the mistaken impression that the product is safe. It is not safe. There are more than 15,000 flavours and a multitude of products and delivery devices. None of them have been evaluated, tested or put through clinical trials. None are approved by the Therapeutic Goods Administration. The consumer will not know what is in any of them.
Some labels say they do not contain nicotine, but when tested were found to have nicotine in them, likely to make them addictive.
The labels on e-cigarettes and their fluids are often lies or misrepresentations. Such labels are not monitored or regulated. Some of the additives are downright deadly, which may cause lung collapse and sometimes death. Others induce seizures. Children have died from exposure to nicotine liquid in the home. Some e-cigarettes have exploded.
Nicotine alters the structure of the brain, and the human brain is not fully developed until age 25. Young people are therefore not in a position to make an informed decision about using an addictive drug. It is not an informed “choice”. It is risk taking. And young people take risks.
We know that 560 Tasmanians die every year from tobacco products, and that two thirds of smokers die from the use of tobacco.
We know from the latest Cancer Council ASSAD survey that some young people in school are vaping and smoking.
We want to prevent the next generation of Tasmanian children and adolescents from becoming addicted to tobacco or e-cigarettes.
Retailers will not have their profits reduced by raising the smoking age, because there are over 600 retailers and the same number of younger smokers — so they will only lose one customer each. We estimate that 800 Tasmanian young people will remain alive into a healthier old age as a result of the T21 initiative.
That a major retailer organisation is complicit with big tobacco, promoting these deadly products and standing in the way of protecting young people is contemptible.
T21 will reduce uptake of these deadly drugs. We urge all politicians to support it.
We want to prevent the next generation of Tasmanian children and adolescents from becoming addicted to tobacco or e-cigarettes.
Len Crocombe is Associate Professor of Oral Health at the Centre for Rural Health, College of Health and Medicine, University of Tasmania. Mark Nelson is Professorial Research Fellow at the Menzies Institute for Medical Research, and Chair of General Practice at the School of Medicine, University of Tasmania. Marion Hale works in health promotion in Tasmania and is President of the International Network of Women against Tobacco (INWAT).