NZ Herald
  • Home
  • Latest news
  • Video
  • New Zealand
  • Sport
  • World
  • Business
  • Entertainment
  • Podcasts
  • Quizzes
  • Opinion
  • Lifestyle
  • Travel
  • Viva
  • Weather forecasts

Subscriptions

  • Herald Premium
  • Viva Premium
  • The Listener
  • BusinessDesk

Sections

  • Latest news
  • New Zealand
    • All New Zealand
    • Crime
    • Politics
    • Education
    • Open Justice
    • Scam Update
  • Budget 2025
  • On The Up
  • World
    • All World
    • Australia
    • Asia
    • UK
    • United States
    • Middle East
    • Europe
    • Pacific
  • Business
    • All Business
    • MarketsSharesCurrencyCommoditiesStock TakesCrypto
    • Markets with Madison
    • Media Insider
    • Business analysis
    • Personal financeKiwiSaverInterest ratesTaxInvestment
    • EconomyInflationGDPOfficial cash rateEmployment
    • Small business
    • Business reportsMood of the BoardroomProject AucklandSustainable business and financeCapital markets reportAgribusiness reportInfrastructure reportDynamic business
    • Deloitte Top 200 Awards
    • CompaniesAged CareAgribusinessAirlinesBanking and financeConstructionEnergyFreight and logisticsHealthcareManufacturingMedia and MarketingRetailTelecommunicationsTourism
  • Opinion
    • All Opinion
    • Analysis
    • Editorials
    • Business analysis
    • Premium opinion
    • Letters to the editor
  • Sport
    • All Sport
    • OlympicsParalympics
    • RugbySuper RugbyNPCAll BlacksBlack FernsRugby sevensSchool rugby
    • CricketBlack CapsWhite Ferns
    • Racing
    • NetballSilver Ferns
    • LeagueWarriorsNRL
    • FootballWellington PhoenixAuckland FCAll WhitesFootball FernsEnglish Premier League
    • GolfNZ Open
    • MotorsportFormula 1
    • Boxing
    • UFC
    • BasketballNBABreakersTall BlacksTall Ferns
    • Tennis
    • Cycling
    • Athletics
    • SailingAmerica's CupSailGP
    • Rowing
  • Lifestyle
    • All Lifestyle
    • Viva - Food, fashion & beauty
    • Society Insider
    • Royals
    • Sex & relationships
    • Food & drinkRecipesRecipe collectionsRestaurant reviewsRestaurant bookings
    • Health & wellbeing
    • Fashion & beauty
    • Pets & animals
    • The Selection - Shop the trendsShop fashionShop beautyShop entertainmentShop giftsShop home & living
    • Milford's Investing Place
  • Entertainment
    • All Entertainment
    • TV
    • MoviesMovie reviews
    • MusicMusic reviews
    • BooksBook reviews
    • Culture
    • ReviewsBook reviewsMovie reviewsMusic reviewsRestaurant reviews
  • Travel
    • All Travel
    • News
    • New ZealandNorthlandAucklandWellingtonCanterburyOtago / QueenstownNelson-TasmanBest NZ beaches
    • International travelAustraliaPacific IslandsEuropeUKUSAAfricaAsia
    • Rail holidays
    • Cruise holidays
    • Ski holidays
    • Luxury travel
    • Adventure travel
  • Kāhu Māori news
  • Environment
    • All Environment
    • Our Green Future
  • Talanoa Pacific news
  • Property
    • All Property
    • Property Insider
    • Interest rates tracker
    • Residential property listings
    • Commercial property listings
  • Health
  • Technology
    • All Technology
    • AI
    • Social media
  • Rural
    • All Rural
    • Dairy farming
    • Sheep & beef farming
    • Horticulture
    • Animal health
    • Rural business
    • Rural life
    • Rural technology
    • Opinion
    • Audio & podcasts
  • Weather forecasts
    • All Weather forecasts
    • Kaitaia
    • Whangārei
    • Dargaville
    • Auckland
    • Thames
    • Tauranga
    • Hamilton
    • Whakatāne
    • Rotorua
    • Tokoroa
    • Te Kuiti
    • Taumaranui
    • Taupō
    • Gisborne
    • New Plymouth
    • Napier
    • Hastings
    • Dannevirke
    • Whanganui
    • Palmerston North
    • Levin
    • Paraparaumu
    • Masterton
    • Wellington
    • Motueka
    • Nelson
    • Blenheim
    • Westport
    • Reefton
    • Kaikōura
    • Greymouth
    • Hokitika
    • Christchurch
    • Ashburton
    • Timaru
    • Wānaka
    • Oamaru
    • Queenstown
    • Dunedin
    • Gore
    • Invercargill
  • Meet the journalists
  • Promotions & competitions
  • OneRoof property listings
  • Driven car news

Puzzles & Quizzes

  • Puzzles
    • All Puzzles
    • Sudoku
    • Code Cracker
    • Crosswords
    • Cryptic crossword
    • Wordsearch
  • Quizzes
    • All Quizzes
    • Morning quiz
    • Afternoon quiz
    • Sports quiz

Regions

  • Northland
    • All Northland
    • Far North
    • Kaitaia
    • Kerikeri
    • Kaikohe
    • Bay of Islands
    • Whangarei
    • Dargaville
    • Kaipara
    • Mangawhai
  • Auckland
  • Waikato
    • All Waikato
    • Hamilton
    • Coromandel & Hauraki
    • Matamata & Piako
    • Cambridge
    • Te Awamutu
    • Tokoroa & South Waikato
    • Taupō & Tūrangi
  • Bay of Plenty
    • All Bay of Plenty
    • Katikati
    • Tauranga
    • Mount Maunganui
    • Pāpāmoa
    • Te Puke
    • Whakatāne
  • Rotorua
  • Hawke's Bay
    • All Hawke's Bay
    • Napier
    • Hastings
    • Havelock North
    • Central Hawke's Bay
    • Wairoa
  • Taranaki
    • All Taranaki
    • Stratford
    • New Plymouth
    • Hāwera
  • Manawatū - Whanganui
    • All Manawatū - Whanganui
    • Whanganui
    • Palmerston North
    • Manawatū
    • Tararua
    • Horowhenua
  • Wellington
    • All Wellington
    • Kapiti
    • Wairarapa
    • Upper Hutt
    • Lower Hutt
  • Nelson & Tasman
    • All Nelson & Tasman
    • Motueka
    • Nelson
    • Tasman
  • Marlborough
  • West Coast
  • Canterbury
    • All Canterbury
    • Kaikōura
    • Christchurch
    • Ashburton
    • Timaru
  • Otago
    • All Otago
    • Oamaru
    • Dunedin
    • Balclutha
    • Alexandra
    • Queenstown
    • Wanaka
  • Southland
    • All Southland
    • Invercargill
    • Gore
    • Stewart Island
  • Gisborne

Media

  • Video
    • All Video
    • NZ news video
    • Business news video
    • Politics news video
    • Sport video
    • World news video
    • Lifestyle video
    • Entertainment video
    • Travel video
    • Markets with Madison
    • Kea Kids news
  • Podcasts
    • All Podcasts
    • The Front Page
    • On the Tiles
    • Ask me Anything
    • The Little Things
    • Cooking the Books
  • Cartoons
  • Photo galleries
  • Today's Paper - E-editions
  • Photo sales
  • Classifieds

NZME Network

  • Advertise with NZME
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • BusinessDesk
  • Newstalk ZB
  • What the Actual
  • Sunlive
  • ZM
  • The Hits
  • Coast
  • Radio Hauraki
  • The Alternative Commentary Collective
  • Gold
  • Flava
  • iHeart Radio
  • Hokonui
  • Radio Wanaka
  • iHeartCountry New Zealand
  • Restaurant Hub
  • NZME Events

SubscribeSign In
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Home / New Zealand

Louis Houlbrooke: World Health Organisation could learn from NZ's stance on vaping

By Louis Houlbrooke
NZ Herald·
21 Sep, 2021 11:00 PM4 mins to read

Subscribe to listen

Access to Herald Premium articles require a Premium subscription. Subscribe now to listen.
Already a subscriber?  Sign in here

Listening to articles is free for open-access content—explore other articles or learn more about text-to-speech.
‌
Save

    Share this article

    Reminder, this is a Premium article and requires a subscription to read.

The World Health Organisation is 'fixated on threats posed by new nicotine and tobacco products', writes Louis Houlbrooke. Photo / Doug Sherring

The World Health Organisation is 'fixated on threats posed by new nicotine and tobacco products', writes Louis Houlbrooke. Photo / Doug Sherring

Opinion

OPINION

This November, delegates from the Ministry of Health will attend the World Health Organisation's biannual conference on tobacco control.

It's tempting to say we shouldn't bother with the thing.

The "Conference of the Parties", or COP9, will update the edicts the WHO delivers to nations that it believes desperately need moral guidance in the war on tobacco.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

For smaller and developing countries, proclamations from such a powerful body can sound like decrees from God. Here at the bottom of the world, our lawmakers have readily implemented the WHO's suggested regulations against cigarettes and all those who would dare smoke them: plain packaging laws, smoking bans in public spaces and vehicles, and, most painfully for smokers, compounding increases to tobacco tax.

Few would question the case for a smoke-free future, but you would hope that a relatively sophisticated nation like ours could figure for itself how to get there.

Our Ministry of Health is flirting with a more independent approach. Annual tobacco tax hikes have been scrapped in light of mounting evidence of the policy's calamitous impact on household budgets. The tax also contributes to violent robberies and a thriving black market – KPMG estimates that more than one in 10 cigarettes smoked in New Zealand are smuggled or homegrown.

The fact that the WHO has given us top marks in its policy scorecard for such a damaging tax undermines the body's credibility.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

At first glance, the WHO's policy preferences reveal a single-minded focus on public health outcomes, economic consequences be damned. But even on basic public health questions, the WHO is driven by ideology.

Louis Houlbrooke. Photo / Supplied
Louis Houlbrooke. Photo / Supplied

The organisation is currently fixated on "threats posed by new nicotine and tobacco products" like e-cigarettes, pushing bans and strict regulations that ignore the role of vaping as an aid to quit smoking and ignore Public Health England's widely-acknowledged finding that vaping is 95 per cent less harmful than the hard stuff.

Discover more

Opinion

Opinion | What would Scotland know about Three Waters?

21 Sep 05:00 PM
Opinion

Opinion | NZ shouldn't have tried to deport terrorist

20 Sep 05:00 PM
Opinion

Opinion | What a vaccine passport would look like - and why our smoke-free law is relevant

19 Sep 05:00 PM
Opinion

Opinion | Welfare doled out with cruelty and inhumanity

16 Sep 05:00 PM

The WHO even gave an award to India's Health Minister for banning e-cigarettes, a decision that denies 100 million smokers access to a potentially life-saving alternative to cigarettes.

Fortunately, on the question of vaping, New Zealand has again bucked the WHO orthodoxy. The Ministry of Health recognises that vaping is 95 per cent less harmful than smoking and even runs a "vape to quit" public information campaign targeted at smokers.

And it's no wonder: a research paper published last week examines four relatively vape-friendly jurisdictions – New Zealand, the UK, France, and Canada – and has found that smoking cessation rates in those countries are twice as fast as the global average.

And despite well-aired concerns over youth experimentation with vaping products, available data suggests it is just that – experimentation. There is no significant rate of daily usage among school kids, and even less evidence of any "gateway effect" toward combustible cigarettes.

New Zealand's new restrictions on vape flavours, advertising and nicotine strength will impede some smokers from making the switch, but on balance our Ministry of Health should be proud to oversee a regime that allows smokers to evade death and taxes with less harmful, more affordable products.

So, no – New Zealand should not boycott the WHO's talkfest. Our delegates should attend and tell New Zealand's story with pride. And if the WHO refuses to budge on its paranoid stance, other countries can look to us as a rebellious example to follow.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

• Louis Houlbrooke is the campaigns manager of the New Zealand Taxpayers' Union and is a vaper. He has contributed a case study on New Zealand to a new paper on international best practices toward vaping.

Save

    Share this article

    Reminder, this is a Premium article and requires a subscription to read.

Latest from New Zealand

New ZealandUpdated

'No other persons sought': Homicide probe continues over 77yo man's death

23 May 08:00 AM
New Zealand

Cook Islands declares dengue fever outbreak, seven cases confirmed

23 May 07:37 AM
New Zealand

Former top cop 'strongly denies' acting inappropriately over firearms licences

23 May 07:23 AM

The Hire A Hubby hero turning handyman stereotypes on their head

sponsored
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Latest from New Zealand

'No other persons sought': Homicide probe continues over 77yo man's death

'No other persons sought': Homicide probe continues over 77yo man's death

23 May 08:00 AM

A man died after being found critically injured in Horeke in the Far North.

Cook Islands declares dengue fever outbreak, seven cases confirmed

Cook Islands declares dengue fever outbreak, seven cases confirmed

23 May 07:37 AM
Former top cop 'strongly denies' acting inappropriately over firearms licences

Former top cop 'strongly denies' acting inappropriately over firearms licences

23 May 07:23 AM
'Felt their back crack': Woman jailed for beating, punching and kicking children

'Felt their back crack': Woman jailed for beating, punching and kicking children

23 May 07:00 AM
Gold demand soars amid global turmoil
sponsored

Gold demand soars amid global turmoil

NZ Herald
  • About NZ Herald
  • Meet the journalists
  • Newsletters
  • Classifieds
  • Help & support
  • Contact us
  • House rules
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of use
  • Competition terms & conditions
  • Our use of AI
Subscriber Services
  • NZ Herald e-editions
  • Daily puzzles & quizzes
  • Manage your digital subscription
  • Manage your print subscription
  • Subscribe to the NZ Herald newspaper
  • Subscribe to Herald Premium
  • Gift a subscription
  • Subscriber FAQs
  • Subscription terms & conditions
  • Promotions and subscriber benefits
NZME Network
  • The New Zealand Herald
  • The Northland Age
  • The Northern Advocate
  • Waikato Herald
  • Bay of Plenty Times
  • Rotorua Daily Post
  • Hawke's Bay Today
  • Whanganui Chronicle
  • Viva
  • NZ Listener
  • What the Actual
  • Newstalk ZB
  • BusinessDesk
  • OneRoof
  • Driven CarGuide
  • iHeart Radio
  • Restaurant Hub
NZME
  • About NZME
  • NZME careers
  • Advertise with NZME
  • Digital self-service advertising
  • Book your classified ad
  • Photo sales
  • NZME Events
  • © Copyright 2025 NZME Publishing Limited
TOP