Nicotine is one of the most addictive substances on Earth. Associated with cigarettes and the cancer — and other health conditions — they cause, nicotine itself is actually not considered harmful and evidence, although limited, would suggest it may actually be good for us.
Still, the ‘rise of teenage vaping’ has been the latest scare story fuelled by reports of schoolchildren vaping in classrooms and principals having to install vaping detectors in bathrooms.
The big fears here are that vaping is relatively unknown and could be dangerous — although there is yet to be any conclusive evidence of its harms published — and that nicotine addiction will lead to young people taking up tobacco smoking, undoing years of anti-smoking campaigning work.
A new study, published by NSW Health, has thrown another spanner into the already highly convoluted and politicised machinery of whether we should allow people to vape or not.
Data from the most recent NSW Population Health Survey, published today, found that daily smoking rates for the population above the age of 16 have decreased from 9.2% to 8.2% between 2020 and 2021. Although this might not sound like much, smoking rates are notoriously hard to get down, so this is a big win.
Jack Revell – The Latch – 2022-05-30.
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