The New Zealand Government will ban young people from ever being able to purchase tobacco in their lifetimes under new plans to make the country smoke-free. People will only be able to buy tobacco products with very low-levels of nicotine, and fewer shops will be able to sell tobacco products, Associate Health Minister Dr Ayesha Verrall announced as part of the new Smokefree 2025 action plan at Parliament today. "We want to make sure young people never start smoking so we will make it an offence to sell or supply smoke tobacco products to new cohorts of young people," she said. New Zealand will impose a lifelong ban on tobacco sales for younger people under a new plan. The changes will not come into effect immediately, giving retailers time to transition to a new business model, Dr Verrall said.

Source: Stuff December 09, 2021 08:55 UTC