‘No one wants vapes for our kids’: Qld passes nation’s toughest anti-vaping laws

The government has passed laws to make Queensland the toughest state on anti-vape legislation, as health data revealed rates of young people vaping had doubled over five years.

Queensland Health revealed that although smoking across the state had decreased since the 1990s, the habit had been replaced by vaping, particularly in young adults and teenagers – more than one-third of young people aged 12 to 17 had tried vaping in 2023, which increased to 45 per cent among people aged 18 to 29.

From July this year, only pharmacies were permitted to sell vaping products.

Queensland Health found about 35 per cent of teens and 45 per cent of young adults had tried vaping. Credit: James Brickwood

The amendments to the Tobaccos and Smoking Act were expected to stop retailers illegally supplying vapes or cigarettes, including fines up to $1.6 million, and up to two years’ jail time.

The legislation also gave authorities increased powers to close offending businesses for up to six months – a penalty no other state had introduced.

The sale of illicit tobacco or vape products and operating without a smoking product licence were now offences, which the state said had “streamlined” Queensland’s illicit tobacco and vaping enforcement framework.

Health Minister Shannon Fentiman said businesses should think again about the illegal sale of cigarettes and vapes, and that the government would “take no apology”.

“We know these vapes are being marketed at children, with flavours like fairy floss and bubblegum, and they’re hiding dangerous poisons like formaldehyde, arsenic, and lead,” she said.

“No one wants this for our Queensland kids.”

Chief Health Officer Dr John Gerrard welcomed the new laws, saying retailers were “the last frontier” in controlling illegal vape sales and consumption.

“[The laws] are critical in our efforts to keep vapes and other illicit smoking products out of our corner shops,” he said.

“Vaping can also lead to tobacco use.

“There is strong evidence that tobacco use is three times more likely for non-smokers who vape.”

Queensland Health’s reports showed smoking had deceased over the past three decades, halving to 10 per cent of Queensland’s overall population, and less than 3 per cent of teenagers.

However, a survey released on Wednesday from the Public Health Association of Australia, and commissioned by ACT and NSW state governments’ health services, found vaping in young people led to an increased risk for smoking as adults.

From a sample size of more than 5100 Australian teens aged 14 to 17, the survey found vaping increased the risk of smoking later in life by five times, and the younger that children started vaping, the more the risk increased.

More than 24.5 million cigarettes and 223,000 vapes had been seized in Queensland in the past year.