BC’s Health Minister says he is getting good feedback from parents and young people after his government announced new vaping regulations on Thursday.

Adrian Dix was on the NL Morning News, where he said restricting the amount of nicotine in vaping products is an important step in dealing with long term nicotine addiction.

He was asked how the government intends to use money raised as part of a new tax on vaping.

“What’s pretty clear about the taxation changes is they are a health measure,” he said. “With respect to the money we’re going to spend addressing vaping, and continuing to address cigarette addiction, we need to spend what we need to spend. The decision to increase the taxation level was clearly a measure to reduce the consumption of vaping amongst young people.”

Dix says he is confident the province has struck the right balance to ensure that people won’t turn to the black market to get their vaping fix.

“It’s obviously something that you have to balance. When tens of thousands of B.C. youth are vaping nicotine based products, potentially reversing improvements we’ve made in the health of young people over a generation,” Dix added.

“The idea that we’re not going to take action I think is incorrect. You have to be conscious of those issues, but I do think that action was required.”

He calls the province’s proposal against vaping ‘the most comprehensive plan in the country’.

“The action with respect to flavouring, with respect to labelling, and packaging, with respect to advertising, I think all of it has been fairly positive,” he added.

“I think the most positive part is the education component led by young people, which helped us so much in reducing cigarette smoking and making it culturally unacceptable to smoke.”

BC Liberal and Kamloops-South Thompson MLA Todd Stone says he was very pleased with the announcement from the provincial government.

He says he’s going to make sure that the government’s plan is implemented as quickly as possible.