Recently, I was chatting to a group of teenagers about what it was like going 'out on the town' many moons ago when I turned 18 years of age.
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The discussion emanated from witnessing the extraordinary level of chemical vape use at the Party In The Paddock music festival.
There were vapers in the mosh (jampacked dancing area in front of the stage), vapers on vapers as revellers boosted mates on shoulders, vapers in camping areas, vapers in the toilets, vapers at the food and coffee vans - it was a chemically induced cloud of vapes, vaping, and vapers.
Disturbingly, vapes have a level of social acceptance amongst young people that will drive addiction, cancer, and death unless there is a far stronger intervention than telling them not to start.
The Alcohol and Drug Foundation recently released alarming statistics, which supports my anecdotal evidence:
"While there's a lack of current data on how many people are vaping in Australia, the stats we do have shown the numbers are growing - from 4.4 per cent in 2016 to 9.7 per cent in 2019.
"And use appears to be more common in young people:
Vapes are e-cigarettes, a battery-operated device that heats e-liquid nicotine, producing a vapour, which is inhaled.
Confrontingly, particularly because of the scent, vapes come in a huge range of flavours - nicotine based varieties such as vanilla custard, watermelon slush, cherry bomb salts, very juicy fruits, caramelised tobacco, sherbet, and berry and grapes.
There are also vapes that allegedly don't contain nicotine, originally introduced to encourage long-term smokers to quit, with flavours including: peach ice, blueberry ice, cherry pomegranate, cola ice, and double apple.
Vapes have and will continue to hook a new generation of smokers.
And in their absence, with new legislation to be introduced banning the importation of single-use vapes, the tobacco industry will again facilitate an addiction campaign.
Sadly, there is no lesser evil.
I can still taste the smell of our bedroom on a Sunday morning.
Mainly, it was the stench of cigarettes with a tinge of Boags Red fumes thrown in that clung to clothing and body parts after clouds of smoke wafted through pubs and establishments.
Patrons did not have to exit in the 1990s and early 2000s to have a 'dart', rather, they could chain-smoke cigarettes even in cafes and restaurants.
The tipping point for the legislated isolation of those addicted to nicotine was the grave concerns held by unions and the hospitality industry for the welfare of workers. By 2006 all Tasmanian licenced premises were smoke free.
Staggeringly, the Northern Territory, Tasmania and the ACT are the only jurisdictions to have completely banned smoking in a long list of public places.
Most readers would be surprised to learn that there are, under legislation, exemptions for high-rollers rooms in casinos where gamblers are still permitted to smoke.
In 2012, former Federal Attorney General Nicola Roxon, whose father died of a tobacco related illness when she was just 10 years old, took on the powerful tobacco companies and industry bodies, legislating plain packaging and the gruesome images that now adorn cigarette packets.
Further, the government of the day significantly increased the tax on tobacco products as a deterrent and an incentive to quit.
Vapes are chemical cigarettes that cause significant damage to lungs even though young people think they are safe because they don't contain nicotine.
A body of scientific research is developing highlighting that vapes without nicotine are causing irritation to lungs, releasing carcinogens and chemicals into the body including traces of nicotine and heavy metals and, with the habit so highly addictive in young people, it is likely to continue or increase the likelihood of smoking tobacco products.
As a result, the Federal Government has stepped in and will legislate to ban the importation of single use non-therapeutic vapes.
Of course, it will require crossbench support to pass both Houses of Parliament.
A meeting of Health and Police Ministers late last year released the following information via communique:
"The latest data, from the first quarter of 2023, shows that about one in seven 14- to 17-year-olds and one in five 18- to 24-year-olds are current vapers.
"There is strong and consistent evidence that young Australians who vape are around three times more likely to take up tobacco smoking compared to young Australians who have never vaped.
"The government will introduce legislation in 2024 to prevent domestic manufacture, advertisement, supply and commercial possession of non-therapeutic and disposable single use vapes to ensure comprehensive controls on vapes across all levels of the supply chain."
And although these reforms won't be enough, like legislation to curb tobacco use, it is a government sponsored intervention that is desperately required to save young people from themselves.
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