First quit vaping guidelines released, with kids young as eight hooked

Friday, 17 November 2023

Sharon Pihema, Māori community liaison with the Asthma and Respiratory Foundation, sees children as young as 8 who are hooked on vaping.

When Sharon Pihema sought help for her then 14-year-old daughter’s vaping addiction, she says the advice from one GP was “just stop”.

So she turned to her local stop smoking service in Gisborne, which said it was only there to help with smoking cessation, but a staffer suggested her daughter try sucking on a pen. “I was like, are you for real?

“It's almost as if they need to start smoking so they can get help to quit vaping.'

Four years on, Pihema’s job now lies in making sure that road has a map, and on Friday she launched the first New Zealand guidelines to support youth to quit vaping.

The guide, written and published by the Asthma and Respiratory Foundation, is aimed at helping health professionals who work with adolescents and young adults (AYA) to tackle vaping and e-cigarette addiction.

Pihema (Ngāti Porou, Ngāpuhi) works as the Māori community liaison for the foundation, where she goes into schools to hear their concerns about students vaping and connect them with support.

Some of these students are as young as 8 — something that fails to surprise her.

“It’s so normal in our community. A whole lot of young people, adults are doing it, and these kids just see it as normal.

“Since vaping emerged, schools have struggled with this. But the amount of time and resources schools are needing to spend on managing students vaping … I recognise the frustration.”

Vaping has become particularly popular with young people. The largest study into youth vaping in New Zealand found more than a quarter of high school students were vaping at least once a week, compared with 10% of Kiwis who reported vaping at least once a month.

In June the government introduced new restrictions it hoped would help curb youth vaping.

They included not allowing new stores to open within 300m of a school or marae, but didn’t make any changes to existing store locations.

One in five high school students were regular vapers, according to a survey conducted in 2021 by the Asthma and Respiratory Foundation and the Secondary Principals' Association.

In Christchurch, a third of vape stores are within 400m of a school.

The guide uses the international Hooked on Nicotine Checklist to score users’ levels of addiction, and includes tools to write a quit vaping plan, pros and cons of vaping, and helps people assess their readiness to quit.

Pihema hoped this would fill in the gaps for people like her daughter, who she said still vapes but wished she had never started.

“She’s tried to quit … she hates the amount of money she has spent on vaping. But it’s hard when you’re the only one in your peer group not vaping.”

Christchurch mother and anti-vaping campaigner Anna Stewart also struggled to help her teenage son kick his two year vaping habit.

She said Smoke Free Kids NZ, which she co-founded, is grateful for the work being done because until recently there was very little support or information available.

“This is a great resource for parents, teachers and health professionals who have really had nothing but international material to rely upon since the vape explosion in NZ,” she said.

Stewart hoped the new guidelines would remind the government that the vaping issue isn’t going away.

The Asthma and Respiratory Foundation’s chief executive Letitia Harding said one in five high school students were regular vapers, according to a survey conducted by the foundation and the Secondary Principals' Association in 2021.

The Ministry of Health’s NZ Health Survey stated one in 14 people aged 15-17 were regular vapers, according to data from 2020 to 2022.

Yet smoking cessation services in New Zealand are funded only to support those over 16 wanting to stop or reduce their cigarette smoking.

“It’s our hope that these guidelines will assist health professionals to support AYA, who are now dependent on vapes, to become nicotine-free,“ Harding said.

The guidelines can be updated as new information becomes available, she said.

Pihema urged the incoming government to get some funding behind helping young people quit vaping.

“We have to do this for our kids. It’s our job to protect them. So if you’re in a position to make change, you should do that.”

The guidelines are available to download from the foundation’s dedicated vaping website Don’t Get Sucked In.