A new campaign has just been released by Leeds City Council and West Yorkshire Trading Standards to warn retailers that it is illegal to sell vapes to under 18s.
The company BAT which creates vapes has said that vape sellers should have to have a license, similar to alcohol and tobacco, in order to prevent the vapes being sold to minors.
Shelley Rowson, a local Mum in Leeds, has said: “It does worry me about the long term effects of vaping, you know what’s in a cigarette but with vaping no one really knows what the effects are. I think they are all doing it, I think it’s peer pressure. I think in their heads they think it’s safer than smoking, but actually is it? I don’t think it is.” Rowson went onto say “I’ve often found the vapes in his bedroom and have just said come on don’t do this but he just denies that they are his.”
Leeds Council encourage shop owners not to sell to minors and for parents to talk to their children about the risks. Councillor Barry Anderson fears that “It will be dragged underground and there will be less control, it could be that the start using illegal ones that have been imported from some parts of the world where they are even less safe than they are here.” The Councillor compared it to the illegal activty of buying drugs and said “They’re not openly on sale but they can always identify someone who is selling them.”
Nationally, the government have plans to include an increase in funding for local stop smoking services, to increase funding of quit smoking campaigns, have a key focus on reducing youth vaping and tackling illicit tobacco and vaping.
