SA vape shop owners push for changes to legislation subjecting e-cigarettes to same regulations as tobacco products
ARE e-cigarettes a safer alternative to tobacco or do they glamorise smoking for kids? Vape shops have sprung up all around Adelaide but now their owners fear new legislation could put them out of business.
A GROUP of South Australian e-cigarette vendors are making an 11th-hour appeal to the State Government to amend a law that would subject the vaporisers to the same regulations as tobacco products.
The legislation — which was introduced to Parliament by Substance Abuse Minister Leesa Vlahos — would prohibit the advertisement and online sale of e-cigarettes.
The devices would also be banned in non-smoking areas, such as outdoor dining venues.
Australian Vaping Advocacy, Trade and Research, or AVATAR, is a South Australian industry body hoping to work with the Government on variations to the new law.
Craig Jackman, a member of AVATAR, had been a smoker for 32 years when his cousin suggested e-cigarettes.
His attempts to quit smoking had repeatedly failed.
“I was smoking up to 60 a day and at night-time it got to the point where every night I was waking up, I was having trouble breathing and I had a lot of coughing issues,” Mr Jackman said.
“Two and a half years down the track, I run eight or nine kilometres every day of the week.”
So drastic were the health benefits, Mr Jackman decided to open his own vape shop just six months after he was introduced to e-cigarettes.
“I said to my wife ‘we need to help other people. We need to open a shop’.”
He opened Vape4Life at Thebarton two years ago, and a second shop at Port Adelaide in January.
Business is booming — it is believed about 20,100 South Australians use e-cigarettes, and the devices are growing in popularity.
Dr Colin Mendelsohn, a Tobacco Treatment Specialist and Associate Professor at the New South Wales School of Public Health and Community Medicine, said e-cigarettes are “substantially healthier” than smoking tobacco.
“Most of the harm from tobacco is due to the tar, the carbon monoxide and the other toxic chemicals produced by burning tobacco,” he said.
“But the vast majority of the 7000 chemicals in smoke are absent from e-cigarette vapour, and those that are present are there at less than 1 per cent of the concentration of smoke.”
He said the harm from e-cigarettes is unlikely to exceed 5 per cent of the harm from smoking, and the devices are commonly used as stop-smoking aids.
“We want people to be able to buy e-cigarettes, not make it harder for them,” Dr Mendelsohn said.
“These harsh policies are based on concerns that e-cigarettes are a threat to public health … but the research doesn’t support these claims.”
But Ms Vlahos said international public health experts believe the long-term health effects of e-cigarettes are still unknown.
“The government proposes to regulate e-cigarettes in South Australia to protect the community from the potential harms and to reduce the likelihood that children will be attracted to the devices,” she said.
Prior to introducing the legislation, the Parliamentary Select Committee on e-cigarettes consulted public health stakeholders, and reviewed submissions from e-cigarette retailers and users.
“In line with the Select Committees’s recommendations, it is proposed that the sale of e-cigarettes through any indirect means, such as online or by telephone, will be prohibited to assist in reducing access to these products by children,” Ms Vlahos said.
Opposition health spokesman Stephen Wade said the Opposition would be “consulting broadly to make sure we are getting the balance right”.
He said it has taken the government 15 months to respond to the recommendations within the Select Committee’s report.
E-cigarettes have been sold in Australia for about four years, but legislation governing their sale and use varies state-by-state. They are banned in Western Australia.
Queensland, New South Wales and the Australian Capital Territory have put restrictions in place, while Victoria will regulate the devices from August.
Mr Jackman, who employs five staff, said should the proposed regulations become law, he’ll have no choice but to pack-up and move interstate — at a cost of $150,000.
“Effectively, I’m only going to be doing the same thing within Australia, I’m just doing it in another state,” he said.
“The government might as well turn to South Australian voters and say: ‘we’re not interested in our revenue, we’re not interested in our coffers, we’re not interested in having money come in’.”
Both Mr Jackman and Dr Mendelsohn say it’s important the industry is governed by a set of guidelines unique to vaping.
AVATAR supports the prohibition of sales to minors and requires its members to abide by the ban on the sale of nicotine, but Mr Jackman said a ban on online sales would effectively kill his business.
“I have a number of customers that live in country areas, or that have disabilities and cannot get to vape shops,” he said.
“They rely on our product to help maintain their status of being a non-smoker, but we need to be able to sell online.”