A new paper from the neoliberal think tank the Adam Smith Institute says if the UK Government wants to achieve its aim of a smoke-free generation by 2030 it will need a liberal approach to safer alternatives.
-
Britain should not succumb to the same moral panic on vaping as has been seen in America.
-
There is widespread misinformation about the relative risk of e-cigarettes. Over two-fifths (43%) of UK smokers do not believe that e-cigarettes are less harmful than tobacco cigarettes.
-
There is a very strong correlation between the reduction in cigarette usage and the increase in e-cigarette usage in recent years. According to PHE estimates, up to 57,000 more people have quit a year due to e-cigarettes.
-
There are 8.56 million smokers in Great Britain, 4.37 million smokers have tried e-cigarettes but gone back to smoking, while 2.88 million smokers have yet to try a reduced-risk product. This means there is a need to expand information about and access to reduced-risk products like heated tobacco and oral nicotine pouches.
-
Among young people (16-24 year olds) the smoking rate has substantially increased in the last few years. In 2016, just 16.6% of young people smoked cigarettes, but this had increased to 23.6% by 2018. Since 2016, vaping in this age group has declined from 5.8% to 4.8%.
Recent concerns about the safety of vaping from the USA are nothing to worry about for UK users. However, a new report by the Adam Smith Institute argues that Britain is at risk of a similar moral panic on vaping as seen over the pond this summer.
Earlier this year, a cluster of people developed severe and sudden lung injuries after e-cigarette use and several deaths have been linked to this. Following these reports, the U.S Centre for Disease Control’s response discouraging the sale and use of e-cigarettes spread a moral panic without scientific basis. The cause, the paper argues currently is likely to have been the use of unregulated black market e-liquids containing THC (the psychoactive ingredient in cannabis) and other chemicals.
As e-cigarette use has increased in the UK, the numbers smoking traditional cigarettes has declined markedly. Since 2012 the number of smokers has decreased by 2 million, while e-cigarette use has increased from 800,000 to 3.2 million people. Over half of vapers are ex-smokers, with nearly four in ten being dual users and less than one in ten coming from a non-smoking background.
This switching has had marked benefits to those who used to smoke. According to PHE estimates, up to 57,000 more people have quit a year due to e-cigarettes.
But the Adam Smith Institute says Britain risks going backwards if we don’t keep up and promote switching to safer products, including encouraging further understanding of and a friendly approach to heated tobacco and oral nicotine pouches. Over four in ten smokers do not know that e-cigarettes are less harmful to health than traditional burned tobacco cigarettes.
Far from the fears about e-cigarettes being a causal gateway into smoking, the report points to evidence that young people are taking up traditional cigarettes at alarming rates again while relatively few opt for e-cigarettes.
The free market think tank suggests seven ideas that the government may want to implement if they want to achieve their stated goal of a smoke-free society by 2030:
-
Develop an evidence-based set of generic health claims that can be used by regulated e-cigarette marketers to advertise products;
-
Commission independent research to develop the evidence base in relation to heated tobacco products, with a view to allowing accurate communication of this information by marketers;
-
Reform counterproductive elements of the EU Tobacco Products Directive post-Brexit;
-
Implement risk-based taxation to incentivise switching to reduced-risk products, building on the creation of a separate taxation category for heated tobacco;
-
Legalise snus post-Brexit with a sensible regulatory framework;
-
Encourage the NHS to take a leadership role in promoting tobacco harm reduction across trusts;
-
Allow cigarette pack inserts that exclusively advertise reduced-risk products.