E-cigarette and vapouriser usage (health and wellbeing needs in South Tyneside)
Key issues
- The UK Centre for Tobacco and Alcohol and Tobacco Studies recently completed a funded trial[2] which highlighted:
- E-cigarettes deliver nicotine as well as or better than NRT
- E-cigarettes appear to be genuinely popular forms of NRT
- E-cigarettes appear to work like other forms of NRT
- E-cigarettes are unlikely to carry substantial harms to users, even long term users
- E-cigarettes appear to be helping people to quit smoking who would not otherwise have succeeded and having a measurable population impact
- Stop smoking services can and do support the use of e-cigarettes both within and without the service
- South Tyneside currently has an estimated adult (18+) smoking population of approximately 22,200 (18.5% prevalence rate)
- In 2016/17 the stop smoking service supported 912 smokers to successfully quit at 4 weeks, using a combination of both nicotine replacement therapy and behavioural support
- South Tyneside's quit rate for 16 / 17 was 46%, above that of the national expectation of 35%.
- While the service has seen a reduction in the number of people attempting to quit it still has one of the highest rates of access in the country. In 2016 / 17 9.6% of the borough's estimated 18+ smokers attempted a quit through the service. NICE guidelines[3] recommend that Stop Smoking Services should aim to treat at least 5% of the estimated local population of people who smoke annually.
- A recent health equity audit has shown that although there is good service coverage across the Borough there are elements of the population who are not engaging in traditional stop smoking service support. These groups include 18 - 24 year olds and the routine and manual workforce, the latter having a higher prevalence than the general smoking population, at 25.7%.
- Many thousands of smokers incorrectly believe that vaping is as harmful as smoking; around 40% of smokers have not even tried an e-cigarette. The accuracy of public perceptions of the relative harmfulness of e-cigarettes vs tobacco cigarettes have worsened over recent years.
- Despite some experimentation with these devices among never smokers, e-cigarettes are attracting very few young people who have never smoked into regular use.
- E-cigarettes do not appear to be undermining the long-term decline in cigarette smoking in the UK among young people.
