A teenager collapsed after just one puff of a vape purchased on Manchester's 'counterfeit street', an Oldham headteacher has warned.
Glyn Potts, headteacher at Blessed John Henry Newman RC College, spoke of how pupils were left 'shocked' and 'scared' after their classmate became unwell and passed out near the school gates after his first ever puff of a vape pen.
It was later revealed that the child had purchased the modified disposable vape, which claimed to contain CBD oil, in Cheetham Hill. Thankfully, the child made a full recovery from the incident - but Mr Potts is warning of the dangers of vaping on young people's health.
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"We don't know what is going in the vapes themselves, and a number of them are repurposed," he told the Manchester Evening News.
"We are seeing vapes that have been reignited with chemicals and toxins that we don't know about. That's certainly the case with the young man that collapsed at our school."
Mr Potts added that the pupil purchased the vape in the Bury New Road area of Cheetham Hill, known as 'counterfeit street,' and was told it contained CBD oil. However, he told the M.E.N there was 'no way of testing' if that was the case.
"It certainly overwhelmed that young person, and then he began to feel very very sick and collapsed," he said.
The incident isn't unique to Newman RC College, according to Mr Potts. He said a number of schools in the region have seen similar events as the number of vapes 'repurposed for illicit means' grows.
"Young people need advice and information that this type of device is not safe," he said. "Even in the most simple nicotine vape, they contain 12 times the amount of nicotine that a cigarette does. I'm not sure that an 11, 12, 13-year-old body can handle that."
Mr Potts said the incident had left the pupil's classmates shaken and 'worried'. "It does shock and scare young people when they see their friends become ill after just puffing on what appears to be innocuous white smoke," he said.
He also warned parents to beware of a 'misconception' that vaping is a safer alternative to smoking for young people, calling the action a 'new form of smoking'.
"I think there's a misconception by some parents that vaping is safe or vaping will stop the young person moving on to smoking and therefore its relatively harmless," he said. "But we're actually creating nicotine-addicted young people, which is then leading to other challenges and other illnesses.
"Flavours like cherry blossom might make them more appealing - but they mean the same dangers."
He added that vaping can be seen as more dangerous than smoking due to the lack of research and understanding around the risks involved.
"Everyone knows the dangers of smoking, but when smoking first arrived it was almost presented as a healthy thing to do," he said. "I think vaping has that air around it, where individuals feel like there are no dangers associated with it.
"We don't know the impact of vaping - and we need that information because the reality is it is simply not a safe option for young people."
He called for action to be taken outside of schools to tackle a lack of information and advice around the dangers of vaping for young people.
"Schools are responsible for so much now," he said. "It needs to be a joined up approach. It needs to include what we are teaching in the curriculum alongside notifications by the NHS and youth groups as well.
"We need to give young people the option to have conversations with trusted adults so they can understand the dangers that are involved."
In the UK, vapes can be legally sold to anyone over the age of 18. Whilst they have been cited by the government as an 'important' tool to help them achieve the ambition for England to be smoke-free by 2030, there is well-established concerns about the harms.
The Office for Health Improvement and Disparities (OHID), part of the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC), has recently worked with the NHS to publish evidence-based information on vaping to quit smoking including facts to tell young people about vaping.
Over the past decade, use of vapes by children has been low. But recent data collected in NHS Digital’s Smoking, Drinking and Drug Use among Young People in England survey showed a doubling of regular vape use for 11 to 15 year olds to 4% in 2021, compared to 2% in 2018.
This was also confirmed in the 2022 Action on Smoking and Health (ASH) survey report. The survey showed a sharp increase in vaping among 11 to 17 year olds from 4% in 2020, before the first coronavirus (COVID-19) lockdown, to 7% in 2022.
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