Flavoured vapes have been causing anger among shoppers who are noticing their bright packaging and visible shelf placement in local shops in Southend.
Liberal Democrat Parliamentary spokesperson for Southend West Joyce Onstad has made her frustration clear in one of her tweets.
Vaping has become a large sensation over the past ten years, and so because of this short time span, it’s not yet known if vaping will cause serious diseases such as lung cancer in the future. Questions have been raised about whether history is repeating itself and whether the same mistakes that were made by previous generations who were smoking are set to happen again. Similarly to vapes, smoking at first was seen as a way to engage socially with people and we are now aware of how harmful cigarettes can be.
E-cigarettes are sold in bright, colourful packaging making them eye-catching and have become a phenomenon with the younger generation. This is resulting in impressionable young people beginning to vape to fit in with their peers.
Joyce Onstad feels passionate that something needs to be done to ensure we are not targeting the younger generation and causing them to form an addiction to something which is likely to cause health issues later in life.
Previous vaper Kieron Knights told Rising East:
“I think I started vaping at 18. My older brother had been doing it for some time and my friends just started as well. It was definitely because of peer pressure. I didn’t want to feel left out or looked down on if I wasn’t doing the same thing everyone else was.
“If I could go back I definitely wouldn’t do it. It took five years for me to fully stop. I’d been trying to for a while but always failed. In that time, I’ve noticed more people have begun to vape, especially more young people.”
“Shops have so many available to buy and they always look nice because of how colourful they are but I don’t feel like young people are taught enough about the dangers of it.”
“I’ve been vape free for a year now and I would never go back.”
A report by Action on Smoking and Health (Ash) released in 2022 showed that 8.3% of adults in England, Wales and Scotland vape which is a rise from 1.7% a decade ago. The report also presented that 18 to 24-year-olds were the biggest consumers and vaping in children aged 11 to 17 was up from 4% in 2020 to 7% in 2022.
In February this year, popular e-cigarette brand Elf Bar were recalled from UK shops due to the watermelon flavour being found to contain at least 50% more than the legal limit for nicotine e-liquid. In the same month, Southend Trading Standards and Essex Police said they had carried out more raids on retail premises selling non-compliant disposable vapes.
It is evident that vapes are hugely popular among impressionable consumers and many people fear that we do not know exactly what are inside of them. One Twitter user wrote, “We banned menthols because they are ‘too appealing to kids’ but you can buy a candyfloss flavour elf bar at any corner shop.”
This is exactly the issue Joyce is trying to target. E-cigarettes are sold in all colours of the rainbow and they are easy to obtain. There are multiple vape shops in Southend and all supermarkets stock them too. Previous vaper Kieron Knights said,
“They are everywhere. You can’t walk down the street without seeing someone vaping or walk into a corner shop without seeing a colourful display of vapes on the shelf. This is all going to come across to kids that it’s fine to vape because everyone else is, which shouldn’t be the case.”
Thomas Cauchi, deputy youth mayor of Southend Youth Council, has said,
“I have seen an increasing number of young people vaping and many people now see it as normal and are not acting on it.”
It is evident that not only in Southend but around the world, people are becoming increasingly worried about the accessibility of vapes and what effect this will have.
Residents want the young people in Southend to be protected from getting lured into e-cigarettes and want to protect their future health. Joyce Onstad, and evidently many others hope for change and want the Government to listen in order to ensure our young people are protected.