Australia has some of the most draconian anti-smoking laws in the world. Like most public health puritans, Mark Butler doesn’t think this goes far enough. Not content with regulating personal lifestyle choices out of existence, Labor wants to ban people from vaping.
Vapes or e-cigarettes containing nicotine are already illegal without a doctor’s prescription, but legal loopholes and black market imports from China have made a wide range of products available both online and under the counter in thousands of convenience stores across Australia.
So what’s the point? Butler has already won the battle against nicotine. As anyone familiar with military strategy will tell you, nanny-state tyrants suffer from something called mission creep. In political parlance, it’s commonly referred to as ‘won’t somebody think of the children!’
To stem the rise of nicotine use among teenagers, the Health Minister has indicated his intention to end the ‘epidemic’ of nicotine addiction plaguing Australian youth. The move is one of the biggest plans he has ever devised to limit the power of the tobacco industry.
Butler said in an interview with the National Press Club on Tuesday: ‘Just like they did with smoking, Big Tobacco has taken another addictive product, wrapped it in shiny packaging and added flavours to create a new generation of nicotine addicts.’
The tobacco industry does not manufacture many e-cigarettes. In May 2022, it was reported that $1 million worth of illegal e-cigarettes had been seized in New South Wales since the beginning of the year. Of all the brands discovered, only one – Juul – was associated with ‘Big Tobacco’.
Now it’s time to think about the children. According to the government, vaping disproportionately affects young people, many of whom have never smoked before. According to research, 1 in 6 Australians aged 14 to 17 and 1 in 4 Australians aged 18 to 24 have used e-cigarettes at some point.
Butler is understandably concerned about children using nicotine. After all, it is addictive. But compared with smoking cigarettes – something fewer and fewer young Australians are doing – vaping is far safer. According to the Royal College of Physicians and others, e-cigarettes are at least 95 per cent less harmful than smoking cigarettes. These life-saving devices have been used for over a decade, and not a single recorded death has been attributed to regulated e-cigarettes.
The problem here isn’t that the kids take it, but what goes into the black market device: ‘nail polish and weed killer’, according to Butler. Safely regulated devices do not contain such rubbish. The puff of ‘smoke’ that wafts its way in front of my laptop as I write this is produced by a combination of propylene glycol and glycerine, the two of which are non-toxic.
There are an estimated 1 million adult e-cigarette users in Australia. Only a small percentage – about 10 per cent – hold a prescription for a nicotine vape. As it becomes harder to come by, Butler may end up pushing more people back to regular smoking. And given that an average of 20,000 Australians die each year from smoking, the health minister shouldn’t be proud.
Blame it on good old British cynicism, but this is a blanket ban in the guise of child safety. To all public health paternalists, don’t tell anyone what you can and can’t put in your body.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not advocating for an unregulated, anarcho-capitalist free market. But if Butler thinks it’s bad now, wait a while and see what happens when you force things underground. Should I mention what happened in Chicago during prohibition?
The sensible thing to do would be to legalise all e-cigarettes and assorted paraphernalia and list the ingredients on the product itself. This gives customers the freedom to decide for themselves whether to buy or not. More importantly it will prevent Australians from inhaling whatever people involved in the black market put in them.
