Butting out the last cigarette

Would a cigarette that has only a fraction of the usual levels of nicotine be worth smoking? The Government hopes not. The Proposals for a Smokefree Aotearoa 2025 Action Plan, released yesterday, says that the dramatic reduction of nicotine is definitely on the table.

‘‘Reducing nicotine content to minimal levels would likely decrease the number of young people trying smoking as they would not expect to get a hit from nicotine,’’ the plan said. ‘‘It should also stop the progression to addiction among those who do experiment and prevent relapse in people who are trying to quit smoking.’’

This is blue-sky thinking at this stage. Such a move would require manufacturers to play ball. But it is one of a series of proposals that are so drastic you might almost feel sorry for those hardy souls who insist on clinging to their filthy and increasingly expensive habit.

That is until you realise how many people have been wilfully taking up smoking since the launch of anti-smoking measures and price hikes.

There are alarming numbers in a section that describes health inequities. The greatest inequities are among girls aged 14 to 15, the report says. In 2019, 6.8 per cent of Year 10 Māori girls smoked daily compared with 0.8 per cent of Year 10 non-Māori, non-pacific girls.

The inequities continue into young adulthood, when Māori women smoke at more than four times the rate of non-Māori women.

These teenagers were born into aworld in which anti-smoking messages are everywhere and cigarettes are both expensive and harder to get. A packet of 20 cigarettes now costs about $35. How does anyone afford it?

Despite price rises, some smoking rates are stubbornly persistent. But does this call for measures that might seem almost draconian?

One measure that could be described as such is a proposal to create a smokefree generation by forever banning the sale of tobacco to people younger than 18 from 2022 onwards. This means anyone born after 2004 would never be able to buy tobacco.

Can we seriously picture a future generation of 50-year-oldswho are still too young to smoke?

Cutting down on outlets that can legally sell tobacco is more reasonable. Pushing up the price of an addictive product much further risks hitting the poor the hardest.

The proposal warns that our smokefree target will not be met. Modelling shows that a business-as-usual approach means ‘‘New Zealand will not meet its smokefree goal by 2025, and Ma¯ori will not reach it until 2061’’.

In 2011 the Government clarified that ‘‘smokefree’’ means fewer than 5 per cent of us smoking. As of 2020, we have 10.1 per cent of Pa¯keha¯ smoking, 18.3 per cent of Pacific peoples and 28.7 per cent ofma¯ori.

Perhaps the target was unrealistic?

But there is a certain cognitive dissonance in some arguments against the proposals. ACT’S social development and children spokesperson, Karen Chhour, said: ‘‘As a former smoker I have to say I’m sick and tired of this Government trying to socially engineer us into changing our behaviour.’’

Of course, the vast majority of former smokers quit because government health measures made cigarettes too expensive and socially unacceptable, or made vaping more appealing. All of those measures are examples of social engineering.

Can we seriously picture a future generation of 50-year-olds who are still too young to smoke?