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In Retford, Nottinghamshire, the town in England where I grew up, there is a shop that sells vaping products. Last year, above the window, someone put up a for all to see that boasted: “We sell vapes to kids — No ID? No problem!”

Even though this may have been some sort of prank played on the owners rather than a marketing tool, it is clear that a large part of the intended target audience for vapes is children and young people. Why else would these products be given sweet flavors and packaged in brightly colored and/or designer-styled devices?

Nicotine is known to be at least as addictive as cocaine and heroin. Research around the globe has proven this. The University of California San Francisco is just one source.

It is also well documented that vaping products contain higher levels of nicotine than tobacco cigarettes. When vaping started catching on, it was marketed as a less-harmful alternative to smoking. Now, health experts globally acknowledge that any use of vaping products can harm your body.

Given how health-conscious the world claims to be, especially younger generations, it seems odd that people remain committed to doing something that can cause irreversible damage to their health, such as issues with the lung and brain development and mental health of young people.

And forgive me for sounding preachy, but those who claim vaping helps them relax have missed the point of nicotine addiction. Of course the consumption of nicotine makes you feel calm: you are addicted to it. Your body now has a reliance on nicotine that, if not served, creates levels of anxiety that had not previously existed — it is how nicotine addiction works.

It seems odd that people remain committed to doing something that can cause irreversible damage to their health

Peter Harrison

If you are one of those people who asks, “Why do you care? It doesn’t impact you,” then consider this: It is already known that smoking regular cigarettes is the biggest cause of preventable diseases. And children raised by parents who are using these products around them are more likely to smoke themselves.

Researchers at the UC San Francisco School of Nursing found in 2022 that, in the US alone, the use of electronic cigarettes cost $15 billion annually in healthcare expenditure — that is more than $2,000 per person per year. In countries where there is a public health service, this burden has a substantial impact on the availability of healthcare services to all.

Elsewhere, a 2022 study of students from three universities in the UAE found that 23 percent of those asked admitted e-cigarette use. And a similar study in ��������Ƶ — ironically of health science students — found that 27.7 percent of those asked were current users of e-cigarette products.

The smoking of tobacco products is definitely on the decline. According to Statista, the prevalence of tobacco smoking among people aged 15 and older fell from 26.9 percent in 2000 to 17 percent in 2020 and is predicted to fall further to 15.4 percent in 2025. But while traditional smoking appears to have fallen out of favor around the globe, do not be fooled — the world’s addiction to nicotine remains as great as ever, as are the risks.

In August last year, the chair of the British Medical Association’s board of science, David Strain, said: “There is no denying we are living in a vaping epidemic. Vape usage has risen hugely in the last decade, with one in 10 adults now vaping. However, far more worrying is the increase in young people who vape, with almost six times more 11 to 17-year-olds vaping now compared with 10 years ago.”

Strain said he acknowledged the role vaping played in helping people to stop smoking, but he slammed the industry for what he said was “so obviously targeting children with colors, flavors and branding.”

It is surely morally wrong that organizations are still profiting from anything connected to the nicotine addiction industry

Peter Harrison

Research has found that many people who previously considered themselves to be nonsmokers have now become vapers. In October, the BBC revealed that the number of adults in England to have started vaping despite never having been regular smokers had reached 1 million, according to scientists’ estimates.

The report went on to note the sharp increase compared to 2020. This rise was driven mostly by young adults, with about one out of every seven 18 to 24-year-olds who never regularly smoked now using e-cigarettes.

It is surely morally wrong that organizations are still profiting from the sale of anything connected to the nicotine addiction industry.

Governments are going some way to combat this very real problem, but I suspect the varying levels of tax raised by their sale makes it very difficult to push for what is surely the most obvious of tactics: an eventual ban on the world’s biggest killer and its spin-off habit — vaping — before too many more lives are ruined.

The companies that make vapes will always deny that their products have any detrimental impact on the world’s public health, as well as any attempt to recruit new addicts among children and young adults.

But given the fatality rate of smoking and the health issues associated with vaping, which include the permanent scarring of lung tissue, related diseases and, in some cases, even death, it is an industry that will always have to entice new users.

The key question is: would the bosses of these companies want their children using these products?

• Peter Harrison is a senior editor at Arab News in the Dubai office. He has covered the Middle East for more than a decade. X: @PhotoPJHarrison