Beautiful Virgin Islands

Monday, Sep 01, 2025

New Zealand Will Ban Cigarettes for All Future Generations

New Zealand Will Ban Cigarettes for All Future Generations

The New Zealand government said it would ban all sales of cigarettes for its future generations, as part of the country’s push to go smoke free by 2025. Anyone born after 2008 will be prohibited from buying cigarettes in their lifetime.
Announced on Thursday, the prohibition means anyone who’s currently age 14 and under will never be able to legally buy tobacco in the country.

“For all the patients I have cared for who have been killed or maimed by tobacco – this one’s for you,” New Zealand’s associate minister of health Ayesha Verrall, said on her personal Twitter.

At present, smoking is still the leading cause of preventable death in New Zealand. It causes one in four cancers and results in 4,000 to 5,000 smoking-related premature deaths every year.

Healthcare officials believe recent crackdowns will effectively eliminate smoking in the nation, making New Zealand the first country in the world to go entirely smoke free.

Along with the ban, Verrall said that support measures will also be introduced to assist people trying to end smoking habits.

The government will also reduce legal nicotine levels in smoked tobacco and slash the number of stores selling them.

According to government data, smoking among adults declined from 18 percent in 2006 to 11.6 percent by 2020. But the rate of smoking is much higher among New Zealand's Māori and Pasifika populations—28.7 percent and 18.3 percent, respectively—which is also why it’s crucial to implement this ban, Verrall said.

“While smoking rates are heading in the right direction, we need to do more, faster to reach our goal. If nothing changes, it would be decades till Māori smoking rates fall below 5 percent, and this government is not prepared to leave people behind,” she said.

But not included in this most recent legislation is a ban on vaping, which studies have shown is about two to three times more prevalent than smoking in New Zealand.

In a 2019 study, 10 percent of surveyed students vaped regularly, or at least once a month. More than 49 percent of these students had been non-smokers before vaping.

Though some health experts praised the government’s new legislation, Karen Chhour, the spokesperson for New Zealand’s opposing right-wing ACT party, has called the new changes “bad policy making.”

“The Government’s gradual ban on all tobacco sales is prohibition plain and simple and it will eventually create a black market,” she said in a statement.

A new law to implement the ban will be made some time in 2022 to give businesses room to transition to a new business model.
Newsletter

Related Articles

Beautiful Virgin Islands
0:00
0:00
Close
Chinese and Indian Leaders Pursue Amity Amid Global Shifts
European Union Plans for Ukraine Deployment
ECB Warns Against Inflation Complacency
Concerns Over North Cyprus Casino Development
Shipping Companies Look Beyond Chinese Finance
Rural Exodus Fueling European Wildfires
China Hosts Major Security Meeting
Chinese Police Successfully Recover Family's Savings from Livestream Purchases
Germany Marks a Decade Since Migrant Wave with Divisions, Success Stories, and Political Shifts
Liverpool Defeat Arsenal 1–0 with Szoboszlai Free-Kick to Stay Top of Premier League
Prince Harry and King Charles to Meet in First Reunion After 20 Months
Chinese Stock Market Rally Fueled by Domestic Investors
Israeli Airstrike in Yemen Kills Houthi Prime Minister
Ukrainian Nationalist Politician Andriy Parubiy Assassinated in Lviv
Corporate America Cuts Middle Management as Bosses Take On Triple the Workload
Parents Sue OpenAI After Teen’s Death, Alleging ChatGPT Encouraged Suicide
Amazon Faces Lawsuit Over 'Buy' Label on Digital Streaming Content
Federal Reserve Independence Questioned Amid Trump’s Push to Reshape Central Bank
British Politics Faces Tumultuous Autumn After Summer of Rebellions and Rising Farage Momentum
US Appeals Court Rules Against Most Trump-Era Tariffs
UK Sought Broad Access to Apple Users’ Data, Court Filing Reveals
UK Bank Shares Dive Over Potential Tax on Sector
Germany’s Auto Industry Sheds 51,500 Jobs in First Half of 2025 Amid Deepening Crisis
Bruce Willis Relocated Due to Advanced Dementia
French and Korean Nuclear Majors Clash As EU Launches Foreign Subsidy Probe
EU Stands Firm on Digital Rules as Trump Warns of Retaliation
Getting Ready for the 3rd Time in Its History, Germany Approves Voluntary Military Service for Teenagers
Argentine President Javier Milei Evacuated After Stones Thrown During Campaign Event
Denmark Confronts U.S. Diplomat Over Covert Trump-Linked Influence in Greenland
Starmer Should Back Away from ECHR, Says Jack Straw
Trump Demands RICO Charges Against George Soros and Son for Funding Violent Protests
Taylor Swift Announces Engagement to NFL Star Travis Kelce
France May Need IMF Bailout, Warns Finance Minister
Chinese AI Chipmaker Cambricon Posts Record Profit as Beijing Pushes Pivot from Nvidia
After the Shock of Defeat, Iranians Yearn for Change
Ukraine Finally Allows Young Men Aged Eighteen to Twenty-Two to Leave the Country
The Porn Remains, Privacy Disappears: How Britain Broke the Internet in Ten Days
YouTube Altered Content by Artificial Intelligence – Without Permission
Welcome to The Definition of Insanity: Germany Edition
Just a reminder, this is Michael Jackson's daughter, Paris.
Spotify’s Strange Move: The Feature Nobody Asked For – Returns
Manhunt in Australia: Armed Anti-Government Suspect Kills Police Officers Sent to Arrest Him
China Launches World’s Most Powerful Neutrino Detector
How Beijing-Linked Networks Shape Elections in New York City
Ukrainian Refugee Iryna Zarutska Fled War To US, Stabbed To Death
Elon Musk Sues Apple and OpenAI Over Alleged App Store Monopoly
2 Australian Police Shot Dead In Encounter In Rural Victoria State
Vietnam Evacuates Hundreds of Thousands as Typhoon Kajiki Strikes; China’s Sanya Shuts Down
UK Government Delays Decision on China’s Proposed London Embassy Amid Concerns Over Redacted Plans
A 150-Year Tradition to Be Abolished? Uproar Over the Popular Central Park Attraction
×