As a former smoker, Ben admits he’s blamed himself for his teenage son’s vaping habit.
“When he was growing up, he saw me smoking all the time,” the Adelaide-based self-employed concretor told EducationDaily.
“So why would he listen to me now, when I’m telling him it’s bad for him?”
In a letter sent by Federal and State Ministers to public school principals across the country last week, vaping was named as the “number one behavioural issue in schools”.
But for Ben and his worries about his growing son’s health, knowing he’s not alone doesn’t offer any comfort.
His 14-year-old child is one of the ones written about in the letter – school students who skip classes to hide in the toilets to vape. Young people who hide their vapes in their school pencil cases and who can be disruptive or withdrawn, because of the impact of nicotine addiction.
“I tell him it’s bad for him, his mum tells him it’s bad for him, he gets in trouble if he’s caught at school and they tell him it’s bad for him – but all his mates are doing it,” Ben says.
Pushing back on peer pressure
If they had their way, Federal Health Minister Mark Butler, federal Education Minister Jason Clare, and their respective South Australian state colleagues Chris Picton and Blair Boyer, would ensure that Australia’s young people would push back on peer pressure.
The ministers all signed the letter outlining the extent of the problem, as well as detailing proposed action by federal and state governments to tackle it. The letter urged principals to keep up the fight. But for some, it’s feeling like a losing battle.
“Vapes have morphed very quickly to become a widespread, highly addictive product, and one being deliberately marketed at our kids,” said Mr Butler, who said it was vital that students starting the year with new friends at a new school don’t pick up vaping as a new habit.
“That’s why on January 1, the Albanese government brought in the first stage of our world-leading reforms to protect young Australians, and why we’ll be introducing world-leading laws to effectively make it illegal to make, advertise or sell single-use disposable or non-therapeutic vapes anywhere in Australia,” he said.
“We are taking on Big Tobacco so they can’t succeed in getting a new generation addicted to nicotine.”
Federal Education Minister Jason Clare added: “Vaping companies are targeting our children” and said that “the federal and South Australian governments are working together to help to get these out of our schools”.
The evidence that vaping is bad is clear
SA State Health Minister Chris Picton called vaping by schoolchildren a “public health emergency”.
“Children as young as 13 or 14 are becoming addicted to nicotine at an alarming rate,” he said.
“Kids don’t realise how addictive these vapes are – or the dangerous chemicals that can be in them. More and more evidence is coming out on the long-term health impacts of vaping.”
It’s evidence that Ben worries about, and he hopes that the push by governments and schools will have an impact soon.
“The fact is – no matter what evidence there is that something is stupid, kids will still do it anyway.”
