Latest / Early Edition with Ryan Bridge / Letitia Harding: Asthma and Respiratory Foundation chief executive on new stats around high school student vaping rates

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Letitia Harding: Asthma and Respiratory Foundation chief executive on new stats around high school student vaping rates · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

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  Speaker 1: New data this morning from the Asthma and Respiratory Foundation
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  Speaker 1: has found that youth vaping rates have dropped more than
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  Speaker 1: fifty percent over the past three years. It's a survey
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  Speaker 1: shows that just twelve percent of year nine to thirteen
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  Speaker 1: students had vapd in the last seven days when the
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  Speaker 1: survey was done. It was down from twenty seven percent
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  Speaker 1: in twenty twenty one. Lea Tisha Harding is the Asthma
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  Speaker 1: and Respiratory Foundation New Zealand chief executive. She's with me
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  Speaker 1: this morning. Good morning, Good morning, Ryan, thank you for
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  Speaker 1: being here.
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  Speaker 2: Now.
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  Speaker 1: Is this flying the face of other stats we've just
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  Speaker 1: had recently about youth vaping.
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  Speaker 2: No, Actually, if you look at the New Zealand Health
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  Speaker 2: Survey that was put out last week, it's a similar story.
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  Speaker 2: We've found that that younger group has actually declined in vaping,
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  Speaker 2: but the older group is actually the one which has increased.
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  Speaker 2: So it is actually in line with what the New
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  Speaker 2: Zealand Health Survey was showing as well.
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  Speaker 1: So you think that your theory is that the the
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  Speaker 1: younger people who are not vaping as much as the
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  Speaker 1: older ones, that's new regulations that's changed that.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, definitely, we think it's the regulations and also the
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  Speaker 2: education around you know, the harms of vaping and the
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  Speaker 2: awareness out there. I think that's had a big impact.
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  Speaker 2: But as I said, although overall we've seen a reduction
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  Speaker 2: compared to when we ran our twenty twenty one survey,
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  Speaker 2: so we reported vaping of twelve point two percent back then,
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  Speaker 2: now compared to twenty six percent in the year thirteen.
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  Speaker 2: That's dramatically increased to twenty six percent having vaped in
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  Speaker 2: the last seven days, whereas it was only twelve percent
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  Speaker 2: in twenty twenty one. So this sort of stands to
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  Speaker 2: reason if we look at our year ten eleven, twelve thirteen,
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  Speaker 2: that was actually reducing back in twenty twenty one, but
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  Speaker 2: it's increased in.
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  Speaker 1: This survey, right. Why do you think that is?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think it's because if we look at when
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  Speaker 2: regulations came and even the R eighteen, the restriction of
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  Speaker 2: buying nicotine containing vapes, that wasn't until November of twenty
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  Speaker 2: twenty and of course we ran the first survey in
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  Speaker 2: August of twenty twenty one. So you've got this group
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  Speaker 2: that had very little regulations around taking up vaping and
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  Speaker 2: some of very very high nicotine doses as well, because
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  Speaker 2: of course, back then the nicotine containing vapes had up
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  Speaker 2: to fifty fifty three milligrams of nicotine in them. So
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  Speaker 2: you've got this group that has probably become quite addicted
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  Speaker 2: to these nicotine vapes, and that's carried on through.
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  Speaker 1: Half of those that were surveyed said that vaping was
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  Speaker 1: harming their health. Does that mean the other half thing
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  Speaker 1: it's fine?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, So when we run the survey, we get obviously
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  Speaker 2: a lot of anecdotal evidence from how people feel about
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  Speaker 2: their vaping, and that certainly came through that it was
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  Speaker 2: impacting their house. Especially these older students. They talk about
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  Speaker 2: things like how it affects their sports, they're finding their
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  Speaker 2: out of breath when they been vaping, and of course
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  Speaker 2: some of them are actually waiting in the middle of
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  Speaker 2: the night to vape as well, which is of huge concern.
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  Speaker 1: That's not good. So what do you want to do
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  Speaker 1: about it. One of the things is to increase the
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  Speaker 1: age to twenty one.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, there's several recommendations, and slowly, I guess, I think
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  Speaker 2: with new you know, we have slowly done this piecemeal
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  Speaker 2: approach to regulations over the years, but unfortunately it has
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  Speaker 2: been just that it's coming in with reducing the nixteen content,
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  Speaker 2: which have been pushing for to be in line with
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  Speaker 2: the EU at twenty milligrams. And that's across the disposable
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  Speaker 2: vapes and of course refillable vapes increasing the age, but
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  Speaker 2: also the advertising being able to see these products from
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  Speaker 2: the front store window or going into general retailers and
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  Speaker 2: seeing these products. That hope is going to change next
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  Speaker 2: year with the new amendments to to the smoke free
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  Speaker 2: and REGAAR products built and obviously we've submitted into that
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  Speaker 2: and we're hoping to see that actually come to fruition
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  Speaker 2: the next year because that advertising would have a big impact. Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: Absolutely, all right to Tensha, thank you very much for
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  Speaker 1: your time this morning. La Tensha Harding, Esthma and Rich
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  Speaker 1: Respiratory Foundation, New Zealand chief executive. With new numbers out
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  Speaker 1: this morning on vaping, twenty six percent of kids of
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  Speaker 1: older teenagers vaping. That's not great, is it. I think
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  Speaker 1: there's more teenagers vaping today than ever smoked, which I
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  Speaker 1: suppose it's what they tell us. It's a bit healthier
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  Speaker 1: than smoking, so I guess that might make sense, and
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  Speaker 1: it's not as much older and you know you don't
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  Speaker 1: smell when you kiss each other, et cetera. But it's
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  Speaker 1: not great, is it.
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