CHARLES BANNERMAN: On why we should be concerned about the younger generation's attraction to vaping
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In hindsight, I must admit to some naivety about vaping when it first emerged perhaps 15 years ago.
I simply saw and almost welcomed electronic cigarettes as a safe aid to people trying to give up smoking, and failed to anticipate that this would create an entirely new addiction, with children among the main targets of an insidious marketing strategy.
But this is the reality of these products which now also have big safety doubts attached; not as serious as smoking itself but serious enough to justify keeping consumption to an absolute minimum.
The e-cigarette industry is effectively marketing an addiction, on which it then relies to keep people hooked on a largely unnecessary product. Research now casts doubts on how effective e-cigarettes really are, even at weaning people off tobacco. Further studies show that kids who start vaping early are more likely to go on to smoke cigarettes.
It’s the situation with kids that worries me most. They are so susceptible to e-cigarette marketing which mercilessly exploits their inexperience, their belief in the myth of no negative side effects, and their adherence to peer group norms.
It gets worse. Amoral marketing has now elevated demand for vaping to a level that entire shops exist for the sole purpose of selling electronic fags. Hitting you between the eyes in their windows are brightly coloured packaging and various exotic, child-centred flavours like bubblegum and blackcurrant.
This is all very similar to the equally merciless marketing techniques promoting alcopops, those attractively coloured liquids which look like fruit juice, have a quite palatable alcohol content of around five per cent... and a kick like a mule to the teenage metabolism.
The other common factor is trite industry denials that these products are being specifically aimed at kids, and bland assurances of a strict minimum age for purchase. Not, of course, to mention that there are always irresponsible adults prepared to front widespread illegal access which is creating an e-cigarette epidemic among children.
Highland Council’s trading standards announcement this week that they are cracking down on illegal marketing of vapes, especially those with illegally high nicotine content, is therefore very welcome.
It’s no wonder that teachers are reporting a surge of toilet requests as twitchy adolescents deal with the nicotine addiction induced within them by vaping companies.
Let’s be under no illusions. The sole purpose of vaping is to ingest nicotine and the resulting addiction keeps the e-fagshops’ tills ringing merrily.
There also seems to be some strange attention-seeking factor here. These expensive gadgets are simply nicotine machines, so it’s bizarre enough to see people going about, frantically sucking on great big battery-powered plastic tubes. What’s stranger still is walking behind a vaper and suddenly finding yourself enveloped in this vast, dense cloud of white smoke that would do credit to St Peter’s Square in the immediate aftermath of a successful conclave. It’s just plain ridiculous... but perhaps also an insidious form of advertising.
This brand of premeditated nicotine addiction is now getting as out of control as the industry’s methods of exploiting it in pursuit of piles of fast bucks.
The days of a well-meaning method of trying to stop smoking are long gone and, to do justice to our children in particular, it’s time to confront this wolf in sheep’s clothing.
• Retailers warned over sale of vapes
