New Zealand has cut its smoking rate almost in half in just six years, with vaping playing a central role in one of the world’s fastest declines in cigarette use.
A major new report on global tobacco harm reduction says New Zealand’s smoking rate fell to just 6.9 per cent in 2023/24 after the government openly embraced vaping as a less harmful alternative to smoking.
The report by Smoke Free Sweden, ‘The Safer Nicotine Revolution: Global Lessons, Healthier Futures’, points to New Zealand as one of the clearest real-world examples of vaping accelerating smoking decline when backed by supportive public health policy.
Source: Smoke Free Sweden
Smoking rates collapsed as vaping rose
According to the report, adult smoking prevalence in New Zealand dropped from 13.3 per cent in 2017/18 to 6.9 per cent in 2023/24, while vaping prevalence rose from 2.6 per cent to 11.1 per cent over the same period.
The authors describe the shift as a “vaping-driven cessation success”.
Unlike countries that treated vaping primarily as a threat, New Zealand formally recognised it as a harm reduction tool.
In 2020, the country passed the Smokefree Environments and Regulated Products (Vaping) Amendment Act, which explicitly aimed “to support smokers to switch to regulated products that are significantly less harmful than smoking”.
That legal recognition was paired with a government-backed “Vape To Quit Strong” campaign and public information efforts explaining relative risk to smokers.
Māori smoking rates also fell sharply
The report highlights particularly dramatic declines among Māori communities, historically one of the groups hardest hit by smoking-related disease.
Smoking prevalence among Māori fell from 37.7 per cent in 2011/12 to 14.7 per cent in 2023/24. Pacific peoples also saw smoking rates drop from 22.6 per cent to 12.3 per cent.
The report argues these outcomes challenge claims that harm reduction strategies only work for affluent or already health-engaged populations.
Most daily vapers are former smokers
Far from displacing smoking cessation, the report says vaping in New Zealand appears to be strongly associated with people moving away from cigarettes.
“In 2021/22, 78 per cent of daily vapers were ex-smokers or dual users –
proving its effectiveness as a quitting aid,” it says.
The report also cites the New Zealand Public Health Communication Centre, which said “the most plausible explanations for the observed changes in smoking prevalence… [include] growing use of [vapour products] resulting in increased quitting smoking among people who smoke and/ or reduced uptake if young people substitute vaping for smoking”.
Falling hospitalisations and smoking-related disease
The report says the reduction in smoking has already started showing up in broader health indicators.
Between 2017 and 2022, COPD-related hospitalisations among adults aged over 45 fell by almost 30 per cent, dropping from 645 per 100,000 people to 455 per 100,000.
It also says New Zealand reduced smoking-related cardiovascular disease deaths and disability-adjusted life years by 20 per cent between 2009 and 2021.
Compared with the EU average, New Zealand recorded 40 per cent fewer smoking-related deaths overall, alongside sharply lower lung cancer and cardiovascular death rates.
In sharp contrast to Australia
The report contrasts New Zealand’s approach with neighbouring Australia, which introduced a prescription-only model for vaping products in 2021.
According to the report, Australia’s more restrictive approach has fuelled black market growth while slowing smoking decline. “Estimates share that 90 per cent of vapers in Australia access their products through the unregulated black market,” it states.
While Australia previously had lower smoking rates than New Zealand, the report says that trend has now reversed.
‘The challenge now has moved from science to politics’
The wider report argues that countries embracing tobacco harm reduction are now producing measurable public health gains that are becoming increasingly difficult to ignore.
“The challenge now has moved from science to politics,” the authors write. “Will global institutions and national governments be willing to rethink outdated approaches and embrace what works?”
Using case studies from New Zealand, Sweden, Japan and the UK, the report concludes that safer nicotine alternatives are helping drive faster declines in smoking than conventional tobacco control measures alone.
