Concerns over impact of vaping among young people in South Tyneside

It comes after earlier this year the Government pledged to crackdown on the illegal sale of vapes to combat “rising levels” of young people using them.

Meanwhile in the past week it has been revealed a loophole allowing retailers to give free vape samples to young children is set to be closed as part of the work.

Councillor Judith Taylor, Simonside and Rekendyke ward representative on South Tyneside Council, raised concerns over vaping and the impact it can have on children at the latest Riverside Community Area Forum (CAF).

Speaking at Tuesday’s (May 31) meeting, she said: “On health, I’m just worried about the young people’s health with all this vaping going on.

“It really bothers me, because they’ve banned menthol cigarettes but you’ve got all these vapes there in different flavours and it really concerns us.”

Rory Sherwood-Parkin, council corporate lead for policy and insight, noted they are aware of national action being taken, and it is also something being looked at locally

He said: “In terms of colleagues in public health looking around this, vaping can be beneficial from a smoking cessation point of view.

“But there are also issues around people, especially young people, getting involved with vaping.”

Speaking at a East Shields and Whitburn CAF meeting earlier this year, Councillor Alexander Donaldson also raised concerns around young children having access to vapes and it potentially lead to smoking.

However he noted there has been “a lot of work done by both the council and other bodies” on the issue.

In October a council report noted 1,500 vaping products were seized over the past 12 months in South Tyneside due to being “illegal in relation to their design, labelling and nicotine content”.

The items were seized from specialised e-cigarette retailers, as well as “small general dealer” types of stores, and followed previous local authority advice to retailers on compliance.

Councillors at that meeting had raised worries around the addictiveness of vapes and how they are “obviously produced to be attractive for children”.