Healthy Communities

What is tobacco and vaping

Tobacco use (‘smoking’) includes cigarettes, roll-your-own tobacco products and any other way of accessing tobacco. Smoking is the biggest avoidable cause of disease and death in Australia. In Victoria, smoking claims about 4,400 lives each year. In our region, one in five people  smoke with some areas as high as one in three.

Vaping refers to the use of small, battery-operated devices (‘e-cigarettes’) that heat a liquid to produce a vapour, which is then inhaled. Most e-cigarettes (‘vapes’) contain nicotine that can have much higher levels of consumption than cigarettes. Nicotine is very addictive and has risks on brain development, and linked to a number of cancers (Yuan et al J Physiol. 2015).

All vape liquids contain a mixture of harmful chemicals including arsenic, lead, volatile organic compounds found in paint and cleaning products and ultra-fine particles harmful to lungs (Alcohol and Drug Foundation. 2023. Online). To make vapes more appealing to young people, companies make their products appear cool or fun, and create a wide range of sweet flavours (Greenhalgh, EM, & Scollo, MM. 18.9 Influences on the uptake of e-cigarettes. 2023).

What are we doing?

The Healthy Communities Unit works to prevent smoking and vaping, and encourage people who are dependent on nicotine to get help

Give Smoking and Vaping Away campaign 

The Healthy Communities Unit has developed a public campaign to help smokers and vapers quit. We are applying a mental health lens to understand smoking and vaping behaviours. We are producing messages that encourage action at whatever stage of the quitting process people are ready for, in a non-judgemental, supportive environment.

Working with young people

Barwon Health is working with community organisations, schools and services to understand why young people in our region are taking up vaping.  We discuss what we can do together to help those that have found themselves addicted, and prevent more young people from taking up vaping.

Barwon Health and a local secondary school are working to help students come up with  messages needed to inform their peers about  dangers of vaping.

Free webinar - Tuesday 30 May 2023

Join us at 12:30pm on Tuesday 30 May for a FREE live presentation to learn more about young people and vaping. 

Workplace Support

Many workers tell us they smoke or vape to relieve their stress. But, cigarettes and vaping can cause anxiety symptoms or make them worse.

We have developed FREE resources for workplaces to create smoke and vape free environments and to encourage their workers to seek support to quit smoking and vaping. We have two sticker options (20cm x 15cm) and an A3 poster available. 

Also available is a social media toolkit. Complete with written content and images, the toolkit includes key messages:

• Include vaping in the conversation
• Your mental health matters
• Friendship is caring enough to say something
• Someone can help you quit

Use the toolkit within your workplace communication platforms to mark World No Tobacco Day 2023 on Wednesday 31 May and help create a healthier workplace for all staff.

Contact the This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. to request your free resources.

If your workplace needs individual support developing a program to reduce smoking and vaping for workers, contact our Workplace Health team.