Northern Ireland Chest Heart & Stroke (NICHS) has welcomed the announcement that the government is introducing a levy on e–cigarettes or vapes.
“We welcome this move. We know that one of the most effective ways of changing people’s behaviour is by increasing price. The fall in the numbers of people smoking tobacco has primarily been driven by the increase in the duty levied by government. Therefore, raising the cost of vaping products will serve as a deterrent, particularly for young people”, commented Fidelma Carter, Head of Public Health at the charity.
“We would hope that a levy on vapes will have a deterrent effect – especially with regard to long term use.”
“We would repeat our message - if you don’t smoke, don’t take up vaping. Only use vapes as a short-term measure to help you quit smoking.”
Responding to claims by the vaping industry that increasing the price of vapes will lead to an increase in smoking, NICHS pointed out that the government has continued to increase the price of cigarettes by 2% more than the rate of inflation – the so called ‘escalator’.
Fidelma continued; “In the case of people who are using vapes over a short time period to help them quit smoking, we do not believe the levy will lead to many of those people choosing to keep smoking. Vapes will remain considerably cheaper than tobacco even after the introduction of this levy.”
“We hope that the Health Minister, Robin Swann, will bring forward legislation on vaping as a matter of urgency. It is imperative that we do all we can to protect young people in particular from vaping.”
