H&S Committee Pushes Heavier Restrictions
The Parliamentary Health and Social Care Committee has written to the government demanding heavier restrictions on disposable vapes to limit child use
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by Dave Cross
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The Committee says the Government should consider bringing restrictions on packaging and marketing of vapes in line with those that apply to tobacco products “to tackle a rise in use among children”.
It says: “The Committee believes that the Government can maintain a public health message on the potential value of vapes as a tool to help smokers to quit while ensuring that its messaging and education, enforcement and regulatory approach keeps them out of sight and reach of children.”
The Committee is calling for the Government to:
- Consider bringing restrictions on packaging and marketing of vapes in line with those that apply to tobacco products
- Review resources and enforcement powers of trading standards to prevent vapes being sold to children
- Assess the impact on use among children and smokers on lower incomes of a proposed excise tax on disposable vapes, which would also help to protect against imports of illegal products - which the Committee heard can contain chemicals including hydraulic oil and antifreeze
Steve Brine MP, the Chair of the Health and Social Care Committee, said: “Decisive action is needed now from both Government and industry to tackle an alarming trend in the number of children vaping and to protect them from its harmful effects.
“It’s clear to us that the vaping industry has not gone far enough to ensure that its products don’t appeal to children. When you have brightly coloured and branded vapes with flavours that name unicorns, sweets and popular fizzy drinks displayed in locations ranging from newsagents to chicken shops, it’s disingenuous for the industry to claim otherwise.
“We heard a wake-up call from a headteacher who told us that hydraulic oil and antifreeze, along with other extremely concerning chemicals, were found in a vape confiscated at her school.
“Ministers need to focus, across Government, on the impact vaping is having in our schools, whether that be setting off smoke alarms in toilets or restricting access to them entirely for young people. We’ve heard this issue is really impacting on the delivery of education in schools and, post-pandemic in particular, this is the last thing we can afford.”
The atrocious letter undermines the accepted position that vapes are at least 95% safer than smoking by stating the figure is “not universally accepted”. It also raises the completely debunked myth that vaping can act as a gateway to smoking – refuted by experts and the data on smoking.
It goes on to recount anecdotes about children not being able “to concentrate in school” and claims “vapes [contain] harmful or banned products”.
The letter of lies can be read here.
Photo Credit:
Parliament photo by Massimiliano Morosinotto on Unsplash, cropped and ape added
Dave Cross
Journalist at POTVDave is a freelance writer; with articles on music, motorbikes, football, pop-science, vaping and tobacco harm reduction in Sounds, Melody Maker, UBG, AWoL, Bike, When Saturday Comes, Vape News Magazine, and syndicated across the Johnston Press group. He was published in an anthology of “Greatest Football Writing”, but still believes this was a mistake. Dave contributes sketches to comedy shows and used to co-host a radio sketch show. He’s worked with numerous start-ups to develop content for their websites.
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