Good idea or not?

[sime42]

Rishi Sunak defends his plan to ban smoking for younger generation

WWW.BBC.CO.UK

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The prime minister tells the BBC he backs the move because there is "no safe level of smoking".

 

 

[GarethM]

Isn't that just a cut and paste of Jacinta Arden policy ?.

 

Yet more government control over something the high taxation is already achieving, hence the increase in vaping.

 

Which on the surface is safer, until you realise it's vaporising oil & propylene glycol.

[Stere]

Seems loads of kids now are vaping though they are talking  of banning the disposable ones but loads of dodgy ones about  already so probably won't stop em doing it?

 

Millions of illegal vapes seized in UK in three years, data shows | Vaping | The Guardian

WWW.THEGUARDIAN.COM

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Experts warn of ‘tsunami’ of illicit e-cigarettes which could contain harmful ingredients

 

Could even be worse going by whats in them.....

[Haironyourchest]

Who knows, time will tell if it works or not I suppose.. don't like the authoritarianism though.

 

But that said, it's a more intelligent way to reduce smoking than blanket prohibition.

 

Raises issues with rights though. You're 34 and want to buy some tobacco. But you've been aged into the system and nobody will sell you tobacco. But your 35 yo friend can buy it...?

 

Who's to say a 34 year old adult isn't allowed to make an informed choice about smoking tobacco? What kind of nanny state dystopia is that?

 

Academic point, since most grown adults who have not been hooked in their teens won't want to experiment with tobacco anyway...but it's still a point.

 

Regarding vaping, there's much misunderstanding about it.

 

The deaths we read about are not from regular nicotine vapes, they're from cannabis vapes. Guys were mixing THC oil with vitamin E oil (don't ask me why) and selling the mixture in pre-loaded vape cartridges behind the bike shed...The vaporized vitamin E oil was causing health problems.

 

regular vape "juice" is nicotine, vegetable glycerin, propalyene glysol and flavor.

 

vaporised vegetable glycerin is what's in the old chunky asthma nebulizers. The glycerin carries the medication. It's basically harmless, converts to water vapour.

 

propalyene glysol is more questionable. They vaporize it in sone hospitals in the ventilation systems, to neutralize viruses. They don't know why it works, but it does, reportedly. In low concentrations, no known harmful effects. But it does dry the mucus membrane if vaped. Some vapers don't like it, and you can get vape juice with lower concentrations of it. The purpose of the PG is to "bind" the flavor chemicals in the juice.

 

The flavorings are an unknown quantity. The talk of "popcorn lung" is hysteria, but there's a grain of truth. The chemical dyacytel (?) gives a buttery flavor and is found in food flavorings and vape juices which emulate buttery stuff, like butterscotch and cheesecake.

 

They flavor bagged shop popcorn with it, and the guys were dumping buckets of the stuff into mixing machines full of popcorn. They got chronic incurable bronchitis from it (popcorn lung).

 

If one vapes pure vegetable glycerin, with or without nicotine, and nothing else...it's basically harmless.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Con]

The most gimmicky of all gimmick policies. Are we going to have 29 year olds hanging around newsagents in 10 yrs time waiting for 30 year olds to buy their ciggys?

[Steven P]

3 hours ago, Haironyourchest said:

 

 

If one vapes pure vegetable glycerin, with or without nicotine, and nothing else...it's basically harmless.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I think that is the thing that will hit them... the other stuff that goes into them, the flavours or whatever.

[sime42]

I don't have strong feelings either way. On balance I think it'll be a pretty pointless exercise, it won't achieve much. It may well make the situation worse by driving tobacco into the hands of criminals, at least with it being regulated at the moment there is some control over what goes into tobacco products. Once it gets into the black market there'll be all sorts of crap in there, over and above the cocktail of toxic chemicals already in tobacco.

 

This isn't exactly prohibition, but it's not far off. And everyone knows prohibition never works. Where drugs are concerned the legal status barely makes much difference to most people. From a personal perspective as someone who once smoked, the fact that it had become illegal certainly wouldn't have made me stop, I would've just sourced it from somewhere else. Same as other stuff. I stopped for my own health benefit, and that of my family, nought to do with the law. Anyway most people start much younger in life, below the  current legal age limit, so raising it will make very little difference to anyone.

 

If the government are really serious about Public Health, (and I don't for one minute believe that they are), then there's far higher priorities in this day and age. There's not even that many smokers anymore from what I've seen around, it's a dying habit! Things like Ultra Processed Food, poor air quality, lack of exercise etc are far more pressing concerns. And then there's vaping, kids vaping specifically. I think we've just seen the tip of the iceberg with that, I get the feeling it's going to turn into a massive shit shower. The govn ought to get some kind of handle on these public health issues before they go back and waste time and money on good old fashioned smoking.

[Mesterh]

4 hours ago, Con said:

The most gimmicky of all gimmick policies. Are we going to have 29 year olds hanging around newsagents in 10 yrs time waiting for 30 year olds to buy their ciggys?

I think the whole point is that they won't become a smoker.

 

I'm a smoker (on and off) and I think it's a good idea. 

 

Although it will be a laugh in 66 years time when you have to show proof that you are 80 years old to buy a 20 pack of regal.

 

[Joe Newton]

Ban it entirely or don't,  except the tax on tobacco is something ridiculous and a good earner for HMRC.

[Joe Newton]

The only reason Rishi is considering it is that very few young people smoke anymore and most vape. I'll wager there are no such restrictions on that. 

I personally do both. Ride or die.