Stop the illegal sale of vapes to children
A FEW years ago, I made a documentary about vaping and asked the question: Are e-cigarettes a miracle or a menace? I concluded that vaping is less harmful than smoking, but by no means harmless if you do not smoke.
Which is why I am concerned by the recent surge in vaping among children.
I have never smoked, but as part of the documentary I took up vaping for a month to see what impact it would have.
For those who have never tried it, an e-cigarette contains a battery that powers a heating element, which turns a liquid containing nicotine and flavourings into a vapour, which you then inhale. There’s no burning and therefore fewer noxious chemicals than in traditional cigarettes.
At the start I did a lot of coughing, but after a while I started to enjoy the ‘hit’, which felt similar to having a cup of strong coffee. I had no cravings and, after a month, I was happy to stop. Although there were signs of increased inflammation in my lungs, these rapidly disappeared when I ended the experiment. After talking to lots of scientists I concluded that vaping was much safer than smoking and likely to do more good than harm, in that the devices may help people quit cigarettes.
But I had underestimated the growing power of social media. In the UK it is illegal to sell vapes to under-18s and there are strict rules on how they can be advertised.
But despite this, a recent YouGov survey of 11- to 17-year-olds found the number of regular vapers had nearly doubled over the past two years, up from 4 per cent in 2020 to 7 per cent in 2022. The proportion of children who admitted to having tried vaping also rose, from 14 per cent to 16 per cent.
And the biggest influence? Social media. Nearly half said they had started after watching vape videos on TikTok, Instagram or Snapchat.
The only bit of good news was that rates of smoking among children have fallen over that period.
It really is time the Government enforced the existing laws and cracked down on illegal sales of vapes to children.