Vaping in schools highlights need for new approach

Statement by Brian Marlow, Campaign Director, Legalise Vaping Australia:

Ongoing media reports about vaping use in schools shine a welcome spotlight on Australia’s utterly shambolic regulatory approach to vaping products.

Australia’s policy has been designed to stop sensible adults getting access to vaping products. Unsurprisingly this has led to the creation of a thriving black market serviced by under-the-counter retailing by dodgy business owners and online stores that are completely unregulated.

These provide the access channels for minors.

Schoolkids should not be smoking, nor should they be vaping. Legalise Vaping Australia has long advocated for a commercial model for vaping product retailing, just like cigarettes.

A well-regulated system would ensure that adults, and only adults, could access nicotine vaping products. Research increasingly shows that vaping is an incredibly powerful tool for helping people to quit smoking. Have we completely forgotten about helping people to quit cigarettes?

As we have pointed out before, the Commonwealth Government, from the Health Minister and the TGA to numerous government funded anti-smoking organisations, have consistently told the public that putting vaping products in the control of GPs and pharmacies would prevent children from having access to them.

It is clear this is not working and a regulatory overhaul is urgently required.

It’s time the government took tobacco harm reduction seriously by alleviating the already enormous strain on GPs and pharmacies by allowing vaping products to be sold on production of proof of age, just as they are in New Zealand and the UK.