The legal age to buy tobacco should go up from 18 by a year annually in order to make England smoke-free by 2030, a government-commissioned review has said.
The plan, if adopted right away, would mean teenagers aged 16 now will never be able to legally buy tobacco in England and eventually no-one would be able to buy a tobacco product in the country.
The report, commissioned by Health Secretary Sajid Javid and led by Dr Javed Khan OBE, former CEO of children’s charity Barnardo’s, also says the government should pump an additional £125 million per year into smoke-free policies.
Other recommendations in the report include:
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Promotion of vapes as an effective “swap to stop” tool to help people quit smoking
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Improving prevention in the NHS so smokers are offered advice and support to quit at every interaction they have with health services
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Requirement for retailers to hold a tobacco license to limit the availability of tobacco across the country
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A further clamp down on the aesthetic of cigarettes to make them less appealing
Almost six million people in England smoke, and tobacco remains the single biggest cause of preventable illness and death, according to the Department for Health and Social Care (DHSC).
One in four cancer deaths are thought to be linked to smoking, according to recent data, and DHSC says helping smokers to quit could prevent 15 types of cancer, including lung cancer, throat cancer and acute myeloid leukaemia.
itv News – 2022-06-10.
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