Image: Australian Health Minister Mark Butler. Photo: Facebook/Mark Butler.
By ERIN WALKER
The Australian Government plans to crack down on the sale and distribution of black market vaping products. Public Health Minister Mark Butler has announced the government’s comprehensive action plan on vaping and tobacco use, in an attempt to tackle what The Public Health Association of Australia’s CEO, Terry Selvin, has called a “public health disaster”.
Selvin says that the new measures, including stronger legislation, enforcement, education, and support are the necessary steps in “standing up to a powerful industry that seeks to profit at the expense of current and future generations’ health.”
The announcement also came alongside the Government’s federal budget measure costing $234 million, to fund a $63m evidence based public health campaign to discourage vaping, and an additional $30m invested in support programs to help Australians quit. A further $140m will go towards the Tackling Indigenous Smoking Program.
Under current law the sale of nicotine vapes is illegal without a doctor’s prescription but many corner stores and online sellers have found loopholes in the law, by labelling the packets that contain nicotine as “nicotine free” importers have managed to get around existing restrictions.
Butler has said that the federal government is intending to work with states and territories to gain control of the spiralling black market, to stop the creation a “new generation of nicotine addicts”.
Butler expressed that “Vaping was sold to governments and communities around the world as a therapeutic product to help long-term smokers quit”, in honouring that Butler announced his intent to make it easier for people to get prescriptive access for “legitimate therapeutic use”.
GPs back new restrictions and tighter controls for prescription vapes
Dr Nicole Higgins, President of The Royal Australian College of General Practitioners (RACGP) backs these measures.
“The RACGP supports vaping as a second-line smoking cessation strategy, it’s something that can work for people who have tried other steps to quit smoking and not succeeded. We stand ready to work with government on measures to boost the number of GPs who can prescribe nicotine vaping products and help people quit”.
However, there will be an implementation of tough new laws on prescription vapes as well, aims to completely stop the importation of non-prescriptive vapes, increase the minimum quality standards for vape products including flavour, colour, and ingredient restrictions, ban single use vapes all together, require pharmaceutical like packaging and the reduction of nicotine concentrations and volumes.
Cancer council CEO, Tanya Buchanan said that the governments amendments and crackdown is a “Historic shift towards ending the vaping epidemic”. Stating that “Unlike smoking, we have a window of opportunity to take policy actions that prevent the growing use of e-cigarettes,”, all ion the hopes of preventing the new generation of Australians from repeating history.
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