Wednesday, 3 May 2023

E-cigarettes

Ryan BATCHELOR (Southern Metropolitan) (17:30): (176) My adjournment matter is for the Minister for Health, and the action I seek is an update on our plans to tackle the harm to our community arising from vaping and e-cigarettes and how the state is working with the Commonwealth to address the issue. In my inaugural speech to this Parliament in February I spoke of the dangers of e-cigarettes and the threat posed by vaping, especially to children and young people. Australia has been a global leader in tobacco control since the passage of the Tobacco Act 1987 in Victoria in the late 1980s. We have led the way in reducing harm caused by cigarettes and other tobacco products. Simply, these policies have worked. Five years ago rates of young people starting smoking cigarettes were negligible. Today youth vaping rates are exploding, as is the related harm. So much has changed so fast.

Vaping use is more common among people aged 18 to 24 than any other age group. Children are calling the Quit line addicted to nicotine. In the past 12 months Victoria’s poisons hotline has taken 50 calls about children under four ingesting vapes. Talk with any secondary school teacher and they will tell you that vaping is one of the most important issues, if not the most important issue, that they are facing. Kids are vaping in class. The regulatory model that allows this to happen is broken and must be fixed. We know that inhaling substances into our lungs is dangerous. Whether it is nicotine, asbestos or silica dust, it kills. We do not have the luxury of time to wait and see a new generation of lung disease to know that we should have acted. E-cigarettes can contain up to 200 dangerous chemicals, including those found in weedkiller, rat poison, bleach, paint stripper and formaldehyde, which is used in morgues. These are inhaled deep into the lungs. It is not safe or harmless.

Vaping is a Trojan horse to allow a new generation to get addicted to nicotine. We know that many vaping advocates have been funded by big tobacco, and when you follow the money, you see a direct line back to those multinationals who have for generations profited from addiction and those who have strenuously fought against every single piece of tobacco control legislation and regulation. This time is no different. It is clear that these dangerous products are being deliberately targeted at our young people – flavours like bubblegum and popcorn, devices shaped like highlighters and USB drives, many colourful, some with lights. It is a far cry from what our cigarette packets look like these days, and it is doing our kids damage. In addition to the damage caused to young people’s physical health, it can impact their mental health. Mena, a mother of a 14-year-old boy who lives in Bayside, told VicHealth researchers that:

The impact of vaping on my son and his friend’s mental health has been very obvious and quite extreme. His symptoms included agitation, anxiety, vomiting and a loss of appetite.

Advocates say that e-cigarettes can be used as a smoking cessation aid. If they do play or can play a therapeutic role in smoking cessation, then e-cigarettes should be within a regulated therapeutic framework that is medically led. I am pleased the Commonwealth and states have been working together and with the announcements the federal health minister made yesterday – a suite of measures aimed at stamping out vaping and the growing black market. There will also be a public health campaign. This is very welcome news.