New Zealand To Ban Smoking For Next Generation In Bid to Outlaw Habit By 2025

丁世礼

据英国《卫报》报道，为了实现.2025年成为无烟国家的目标，新西兰拟推出新法案，禁止下一代人口购买烟草。根据该法案，14岁以下的年轻人将永远不能在新西兰合法购买香烟。这—年龄限制将逐年提高，以扩大终身禁烟的人口比例。

New Zealand has  announced it will  outlaw  smoking for the next generation， so that those who are aged 14 and under today will never be legally able to buy tobacco.

New legislation means the legal smoking age will in- crease every year， to create a smoke-free generation of New Zealanders， associate health minister Dr Ayesha Verrall saidon Thursday.

新西兰宣布，将禁止下一代人吸烟，因此14岁以下人群将终身无法合法购买烟草。

新西兰卫生部副部长阿伊莎·韦拉尔博士12月9日表示，新法案意味着合法吸烟年龄将逐年提高，以实现新西兰的无烟一代。

“This is a historic day for the health of our people，”she said.

The government announced the rising age alongsideother measures to make smoking unaffordable and inaccessible， to try to reach its goal of making the country entirelysmoke- free within the next four years. Other measures include reducing the legal amount of nicotine in tobacco products to very low levels， cutting down the shops where cigarettes could legally be sold， and increasing funding to addiction services. The new laws will not restrict vape sales.

“We want to make sure young people never start smoking so we will make it an offence to sell or supply smokedtobacco products to new cohorts of youth. People aged 14when the law comes into effect will never be able to legallypurchase tobacco，”Verrall said.

New Zealand’s daily smoking rates have been dropping over time — down to 11.6% in 2018， from 18% a decade earlier. But smoking rates for Māori and Pacifika werefar higher — 29% for Māori and 18% for Pasifika.“Ifnothing changes， it would be decades till Māori smoking ratesfall below 5%，”Verrall said. She said eradicating smokingin the next four years was within reach：“I believe it is. Theissue is， though， if we don’t change what we’re doing， wewon’t make it for Maori — and that’s what the plan is really focused on”.

Smoking has already been widely replaced by vapingamong teenage New Zealanders， and is also attracting manyyoung people who would never have taken up smokingaccording to surveying of 19，000 high school students thisyear， nearly 20% were vaping daily or several times a day，the majority with high nicotine doses. That’s compared to3% of those aged 15—17 who smoked daily in 2018， or13% who smoked a decade earlier.

Verrall said the legislation would be introduced in2022， with the age limits coming in in 2023.

她說：“这对新西兰人民的健康来说是具有历史意义的一天。”

新西兰政府宣布提高合法吸烟年龄，同时采取其他措施，让人们无力购买烟草且难以获得，以努力实现其在未来四年内全国彻底无烟的目标。新西兰政府的措施还包括将烟草产品中尼古丁的合法含量降低到极低水平，减少可以合法出售香烟的商店，以及增加戒烟服务拨款。这项新法规不会限制电子烟的销售。

韦拉尔称：“我们希望确保年轻人永远不会吸烟，因此我们将把向新生代年轻人出售或提供烟草制品定为犯罪行为。法律生效后，14岁以下人群将终身无法合法购买烟草。”

从2011年的18%到2018年的11.6%，新西兰的每日吸烟率一直在下降。但毛利人和岛民的吸烟率要高得多，分别为29%和18%。韦拉尔说：“如果不做任何改变，将毛利人的吸烟率下降至5%以下将需要几十年的时间。”她说，在未来四年内全面无烟是可以实现的，“我相信我们可以做到。不过，问题是，如果我们不做出改变，就无法让毛利人实现这一目标——而这正是该法案真正关注的。”

在新西兰青少年群体中，纸烟已经被电子烟广泛取代，电子烟也吸引了许多从未吸过烟的年轻人。根据今年对19000名高中生的调查，近20%的人每天至少吸一次电子烟。其中大多数人吸食的尼古丁剂量很高。相比之下，2018年，在15-17岁的人群中，每天吸纸烟的人为3%，2011年每天吸纸烟的人为13%。

韦拉尔表示，该法案将于2022年出台，关于合法吸烟的年龄限制将于2023年实施。