More Parliament
Back to the Department of Health for our last set of questions and answers of the week
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by Dave Cross
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Kirsten Oswald, the Shadow SNP Spokesperson for Women and their Shadow Spokesperson for Equalities asked the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care what steps are being taken to help raise public awareness of “the risks of vaping”.
Oswald didn’t explain what these supposed risks are.
Parliamentary Under-Secretary Leadsom is always happy to talk about vaping risks though – even if she has made some of them up. She said: “The Government is concerned about the worrying rise in vaping among children. Youth vaping has tripled in the last three years, and one in five children now use a vape. The health advice is clear, if you don’t smoke, don’t vape – and children should never vape. That is why we are taking decisive action to ban disposable vapes alongside broader measures to restrict flavours, vape packaging and where vapes are displayed. We will introduce legislation as soon as possible.
“The department delivers a range communications and media activity to provide updates on vaping policy and raise public awareness of the risks of vaping – for example, Ministers and the Chief Medical Officer regularly undertake broadcast interviews. The department is also currently in the process of developing new advice and guidance for the Better Health website.
“Over the past two years we have also taken several steps to increase training resources and support available for teachers and schools. In October 2022, we published new content on the risks of vaping for young people on the FRANK and Better Health websites and have provided input to educational resources produced by partners including the PSHE Association.
“The department is currently in conversations with leading technology and social media platforms to reduce the visibility of any content that might glamourise vaping to children and young people, while increasing and enhancing the signposting to trusted sources of information on the harms to children from vaping.”
Kirsten Oswald followed up by asking the Department for Health and Social Care whether an assessment has been made of the potential impact of advertising vape products in sports venues and on sports kits on health outcomes.
It’s reasonable to take it she didn’t mean ‘good’ outcomes, like adult smokers being more aware of the safer alternative and how switching works better than any other approach to smoking cessation.
Leadsom didn’t want to focus on the good that comes from vape advertising at adult sporting events and venues either – or answering the question come to that. She told Oswald: “The Government is concerned about the worrying rise in vaping among children. Youth vaping has tripled in the last three years, and one in five children now use a vape. The health advice is clear: if you don’t smoke, don’t vape, and children should never vape. In our recent consultation response, we set out our plan to introduce legislation as soon as possible to further crack down on youth vaping by providing powers to restrict flavours, point of sale and packaging of vaping products.”
We desperately need a Parliamentary Under-Secretary at the Department for Health who can understand evidence and using it to make sound policy decisions again.
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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