April 28, 2024. 6:35am
The “fruity sensation of taste” is what initially drew me to it but now I regret it…
While the UK government is taking steps to prevent children under the age of 18 from vaping, The Colonist Report investigation has found that young people are devising ways to obtain vapes in stores.
CCTV footage shown to The Colonist Report shows underage children dressed in high school uniforms in North West London invading a shop and carting away with vapes.
We sent emails to six high schools in the UK to inquire about the scope of advocacy and measures in place to reduce vaping among children under the age of 18, but none responded.
The World Health Organisation stated in an email to The Colonist Report that, while vaping is promoted as a way to quit smoking, “e-cigarettes as used in the real-world have not been proven to be effective for smoking cessation at the population level.”
Harrow Council was accused of using underage children to purchase vapes in an attempt to identify and find stores that sell them to children. The council never responded to our email seeking comments.
Vape manufacturers claim that vapes are harm-reduction products that can help people quit smoking. However, the invention of vapes appears to be a more pressing issue for the UK government to address, as statistics show a high rate of children vaping. According to research, approximately 69% of vapers aged 11 to 17 in Great Britain are vaping.
The sale and supply of disposable vape has been banned in England, Scotland, and Wales because of their appeal to young people. The government has stated that children turning 15 this year and younger will never be legally sold tobacco. Adults will still have access to non-disposable vapes to help them quit smoking.
On some occasions, the underage kids’ connive with their friends who pretend to be their parents who had sent them to buy vapes, said Avan Kawani, a vape seller.
Kawani said: “When they visit my store, they tell me that their parents sent them to buy vape. If I say no, they will call the person and say I should talk to them.
“I will inform the person on the phone to call me through a video call on Whatsapp or they come in person to purchase the vape, but they never show up,” he said.
Kawani, has two shops in Harrow, and one of the shops only has groceries, drinks, and vapes, while the other shop only has e-cigarettes. According to him, even though he sells vapes, he still discourages consumers from buying them “because it is not good.”
Kawani told The Colonist Report that he always asks for an ID card before selling to young people, “even when they are over 18 and on most occasions, when he refuses to sell the vapes, the young people will abuse him and lay curses on him.
On September 27, 2023, some high school students invaded Kawani grocery shop and began stealing vaping products. The video footage shown to The Colonist Report revealed that the high school students were boys and girls in strategic positions in his stores, stealing vapes and other items.
Kawani said: “I took the footage and showed to their school that I won’t be pressing any charges or reporting to the police, but they should speak to the children and parents to guide them because vaping is bad.
“The school said they would come to my shop to discuss with me but they never showed up.”
“I have to remove the vapes from the grocery shops to the other store, where I have more advanced staff to monitor the product.
On two different occasions, the Harrow council has used underage children to come buy vapes when I was not in the store, he said and continued:. “The first time, I had just hired a new staff and told her not to sell vapes and cigarettes to underage, but immediately, when I stepped out, I received a call from the council that she had sold vapes to underage.
“I had a problem with the council and I explained to the council about the warning I gave to the new girl, so I was not fined but was given a warning.
According to him, two years later, when he had just hired another new female worker and warned her not to sell vapes, the council called that I had sold vapes to the underage. “The council deliberately sent underage children to my shop when I had just hired a new worker, and they come to the shop when I am not around. “I was angry and told the council that it was a deliberate attempt to always send underage children to my shop when I am not around and when I have a new worker.
“But I was told it was not deliberate but it happens sometimes,” he said. “I wasn’t also fined by the council.”.
Dave Bidiyani sells vapes in Harrow town, and he has had encounters with children who want to buy vapes, but according to him, he never sells to them unless they show their identification card, which proves that they are over 18.
Bidiyani said: “Before we sell vapes to young people, we ask them to give us ID but they will say it is digital and the digital ID can be reproduced on a computer.”
On one occasion, a person under the age of 16 attempted to purchase vapes at the Bidiyani shop while using a fake driver’s licence that showed he was an adult. “But I asked him to show me his oyster card.”
“That is how I found out he was underage,” he continued. “He has changed the photo on his driver’s licence to an adult, but he is holding an underage oyster card.
According to Bidiyani, the Harrow Council sometimes sends underage children from the community to buy vapes in order to determine whether vape sellers are selling to minors. “If we sell to children, we could lose our licence.”
The Colonist Report sent an email to the Harrow council for comment on the accusation by vape sellers that the council uses underage to determine whether stores sell vapes to children under the age of 18. We also asked the council what safeguarding measures have been put in place to prevent and protect children and ensure that they do not vape, and how the council checks for compliance. The council never replied to our email.
Although it is expressly prohibited to use electronic cigarettes on trains and public buses, The Colonist Report discovered that young high school students have been seen vaping on multiple occasions. There have also been reports of young people being ejected from trains after being caught vaping on board.
The majority of vapes contain nicotine, and according to the US Centres for Disease Control, nicotine is highly addictive and can harm adolescent brain development, which lasts until the early to mid-20s. In addition to nicotine, e-cigarettes may contain other harmful substances. Young people who use e-cigarettes may become more likely to smoke cigarettes in the future, said the US CDC.
Lol Sammy began vaping when she was 28 years old and living outside of her parents’ house. She stated that the “fruity sensation of taste” is what initially drew her to it.
Sammy, now 30, used to take one vape per day for £5, but she now takes two, costing her a total of £10 per day, and occasionally buys one for £20. “I would say in a week, I would typically spend around £50 on it, so it does take a toll on your pocket.”
“If I am going somewhere, especially if I am going out on the weekend, I will buy more, so it will cost more than £50 in a week, which is simply not worth it.”
Sammy told The Colonist Report that she has never smoked cigarettes or any other tobacco product other than vapes and has become so addicted to vapes that she is unable to stop despite several attempts and health problems as a result of vaping.
She said, “I have tried to stop before because I have really bad cough symptoms in my throat and I do not know what they are. I was so addicted that I found it difficult to gravitate towards anything else, other than the vape.
“I have had a really bad cough.
“Sometimes in my throat, I do feel like it has given me a bad chest sometimes, like, I get really dehydrated so like an excess amount of water in my throat.”
She wished she had realised how addictive vaping was. According to her, feeding was only an option if she had a vape. “I think it is something I wish I would told myself four years ago before I started vaping.
“I wish I had known how addictive it is, how expensive it is, and how much. Sometimes, I will vape instead of eating and it’s not a substitute for food, but I feel like I’m too dependent on the vape, and I don’t think the younger people should ever do it because it’s one of the things I highly regret.”
John Steward, another UK resident, has tried unsuccessfully to quit vaping. He told The Colonist Report that he has been vaping for over three years and has not had any health issues linked to vaping but he spends an average of £35 per week on vapes. The flavour of the vapes is what drives him to continue vaping. “I have felt like stopping on numerous occasions, just because I feel like it’s not good but I just can’t stop.”
Professor Best Ordinoha from Nigeria’s University of Port Harcourt School of Public Health said the short-term effects of vaping are mild and easily treatable, but they typically manifest within a few days. They include irritation of the throat and mouth caused by contact with the vapour, which can lead to cough, catarrh, and respiratory infections.
“But the long-term effect can cause cancer of the mouth and throat, which cannot be ruled out,” and it can take close to or more than a decade to fully manifest.”
He urged vapers to stop vaping due to the immediate long-term health consequences.
According to the 2022 report by the UK’s Office for National Statistics, there are around 4.5 million vapers in the population of Great Britain.
Disposable vapes are made from plastic and are powered by a battery that is made from lithium-ion, which makes them very difficult to recycle.
The Colonist Report has seen disposal vapes in different areas in the UK, and suggests that one disposable vape is thrown either on the public road or waste bin every minute.
Vape batteries can explode and catch fire when not properly managed. A bin in the UK almost caught fire after vapes were discarded in it. The UK’s North Somerset Council warns residents to avoid discarding vapes in the bin and if they must, it should be put in a transparent bag to alert bin collectors.
According to Material Focus research, the number of disposable single-use vapes discarded in the UK has quadrupled in a year to 5 million per week, with 7.7 million single-use vapes purchased each week.
An investigation published in 2022 by the Bureau of Inestigative Journalism revealed that over 40 tonnes of lithium were thrown out with disposable vapes in the UK in 2022. That’s enough to make batteries for 5,000 electric cars! For a green transition, we need to get the most use out of scarce minerals like lithium, said Green Peace.
One road sweeper from the Chelsea and Keningston council areas, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, told The Colonist Report that every time she sweeps the road, she finds more than five disposal vapes, which she packs for proper disposal. She never told us the process of disposal.
According to GreenPeace, “the main issue with disposable vapes is that they are, well, disposable.” “A market full of single-use products is unsustainable.”
Dr Rachel Barry, a researcher with the Tobacco Control Research Group (TCRG) at the University of Bath, has been exploring tobacco company investments in e-cigarettes and heated tobacco products (HTPs) and their underlying motivations for engaging in wider debates about harm reduction. Her research suggests that tobacco company investment in these newer products is the latest manifestation of a decades-long effort to misuse the concept of “harm reduction” to undermine tobacco control.
According to Dr Barry, tobacco companies have long claimed that they are committed to reducing harm by developing and investing in so-called “less harmful” products. This conduct dates back to at least the 1950s, when the major tobacco companies first developed and marketed filter-tipped and ‘light’ cigarettes in response to ongoing threats to their highly profitable cigarette business.
Barry said: “Major tobacco companies, notably Philip Morris International (PMI) and British American Tobacco (BAT), are now making even greater claims of a commitment to not just harm reduction but to ‘transformation’, by alleging taking actions to advance a smoke-free future. However, these claims contradict the actions of major tobacco companies, which continue to invest in new cigarette companies and brands, heavily market cigarettes and obstruct implementation of effective tobacco control measures on a global scale.”
While we do not know the long-term effects of e-cigarettes on population health nor the health implications of different regulatory approaches to e-cigarettes, what we do know is that major tobacco companies are using the UK’s approach to e-cigarettes as a way to push for more industry-friendly policies in other contexts, said Barry. “This is particularly the case in low-and-middle-income countries (LMICs), where the tobacco industry has a track record of interference and weakening of public health policy and tobacco control.”
“It should be stressed that the UK’s approach to regulating e-cigarettes is meant to address its own particular circumstances, and therefore it should not serve as a model for other governments to follow. Instead, the UK’s approach may provide important lessons that other governments can learn from and adapt to meet their own distinctive situations.”
Tim Luimes, an investigative journalist, who has been reporting on the tobacco industry since 2020, observed that tobacco companies see cigarettes being regulated more strictly and want to keep making profits with a new, less regulated product. “By using the narrative of tobacco harm reduction, in which they say that vapes are less harmful than cigarettes, they hope to have it regulated as a way to quit smoking instead of as a toxic and addictive product.”
According to Luimes, his investigation also found that tobacco companies have funded consumer groups like the World Vapers’ Alliance, which lobbies for regulating vaping less strictly.
Editor’s note: Both John Steward and Lol Sammy are not the real names of the sources. They preferred to be anonymous.
Additional reporting and editing by Woke Kevin
This investigation was produced with funding from JournalismFund Europe.
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