Councillors ask for more evidence linking vaping to quitting smoking before agreeing to e-cigarette trial

Councillors have asked to see more evidence linking taking up vaping to quitting smoking before endorsing a proposal to offer e-cigarettes to smokers.

Peterborough City Council’s (PCC) health scrutiny committee voted unanimously to hold off supporting the plan which would see smokers given vapes as part of a structured attempt to quit smoking until they are provided with an extra briefing.

Cllr Shabina Qayyum (Labour, East), chair of the committee, introduced this request and asked that it include “an overview of evidence to health outcomes with reference to vaping” and vaping's “links to smoking cessation”.

“We don’t have staunch evidence trying to back up health outcomes and it has been stipulated that there are carcinogenic ingredients within vapes themselves,” she said at a committee meeting where the proposal was discussed. “So it’s a matter of concern to me.”

If ultimately approved, the proposal would mean that a one-year pilot program was carried out in which vapes were given to smokers to test whether the switch improves their chances of quitting cigarettes for good.

This has already begun in other regions and is being adopted nationally, say PCC officers and members of the region’s Integrated Care Board (ICB) who drew up the plans.

While acknowledging that less is known about the long-term effects of vaping than smoking cigarettes, they added that vapes are believed to be less harmful, containing far fewer substances that can cause cancer than cigarettes, and have been shown to help people quit smoking nationally.

“There are concerns that we don’t fully understand vapes,” a PCC officer told councillors at the meeting. “But we do know that they don’t have all the carcinogenic products in them that cigarettes have. There is that unnecessary intake of nicotine, but it does seem to help people stop smoking.”

Another added that: “I’ve been quite anti-introducing e-cigarettes into our service and the team have had to work really hard to get me on side.”

“I’ve been convinced by the evidence that they are actually more effective at quitting than other pharmacological options and that the risks are preferable to smoking,” she said. “It’s not without risk – we’re walking a tightrope here – we don’t want people to take up vaping if they don’t smoke.”

She continued that the council has sought legal advice on the pilot as vapes are not yet licensed as a treatment for smoking and received a reassuring response, particularly as the Government is also supportive of the swap.

But Cllr Qayyum was not the only councillor to raise concerns over the pilot; Cllr Heather Skibsted (Greens, Orton Longueville) said at the meeting that “vaping does not address nicotine addiction and we still don’t know the long term effects of what vaping will cause”.

The Local Government Association (LGA) – which represents councils across England and Wales – has also recently raised concerns over vapes, calling for single use vapes to be banned by 2024 on the grounds that they are harmful to the environment and to young people.

The proposal PCC is considering specifies that only “regulated vapes that are refillable and have recyclable bottles” would be given to adult smokers.

While councillors didn’t immediately approve the proposal, they did, however, approve other anti-smoking measures, including expanding Cambridgeshire and Peterborough’s school-based programmes that address smoking and vaping in youngsters and increased spot checks on shops selling substandard vapes and cigarettes.