Just across the ditch, New Zealand is taking a more proactive approach in dealing with smoking with Smokefree Aotearoa 2025. Instead of imposing draconic vaping bans, they actually actively promote vaping as one of the, if not THE way to effectively stop smoking. They have set up a website called Vaping Facts NZ where they have laid out all of the information available on vaping, the good and the bad, and leave the decisions to the smoker instead of forcing what people should be doing.
Vaping Facts NZ has there on its front page, in BIG and BOLD LETTERS, VAPING CAN HELP YOU QUIT SMOKING, and VAPING IS LESS HARMFUL THAN SMOKING.
And before I forget, this is a program by the New Zealand Government. Yes, their government is telling people to vape if they want to successfully quit smoking. The keyword here? Successfully. The only regulation New Zealand has about vaping is that it cannot claim to have therapeutic effects, which is fine, since they’re already saying that it can help stop smoking and it is safer, that’s all the claims we need when it comes to vaping. Oh, yes and vaporizers and e-liquids cannot be sold to minors, which is something every vaper agrees with.
How can two countries which are neighbors and share practically the same cultures have two completely different approaches to smoking cessation? In Australia, many of the top medical decision-makers still harp about how nicotine can be addictive. Well, newsflash, everybody knows that nicotine is addictive, that’s why people are smoking and vaping in the first place! This is not what vapers are fighting for. Vapers and medical experts are not saying that vaping is safe, we’re saying that it is SAFER than smoking traditional tobacco products. It’s like the concept of harm reduction has been conveniently forgotten.
They keep saying that vaping nicotine e-liquid is bad, but at the same time, it pushes people to use nicotine products like gums and patches, which many studies have found to be ineffective and many smokers can testify to as being a waste of time and money. See what we’re getting at? Big pharma nicotine is good, vaping nicotine is bad.