Legal age for buying cigarettes should rise by a year every year, report states

A new report has advised the legal age for buying cigarettes in England should rise year by year to tackle smoking.

The independent review, led by Dr Javed Khan OBE, will now be considered as part of the government's Health Disparities White Paper with a response to be published as well. It was commissioned by health secretary Sajid Javid and also sets out a variety of recommendations to help Downing Street meet its smoke-free promise by 2030.

One of the major key points in the review calls for the smoking age to increase annually until no one in the country is able to buy tobacco. Furthermore, an increased investment of £125 million per year will be injected into smoke-free policies alongside an extra £70 million a year for smoking cessation services, the Mirror reports

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In England alone, almost six millions people smoke with tobacco remaining as the single biggest cause of preventable illness and death. Quitting smoking can help prevent 15 types of cancers such as lung cancer, throat cancer and acute myeloid leukaemia.

The independent review also found that smoking causes a disproportionate burden on the most vulnerable families and communities. For example, smoking is 4.5 times higher in Burnley than in Exeter.

Smokers in the most deprived areas of the country were also found to spend a higher portion of their income on tobacco. The average smoker in the North East spends over 10 per cent of their income on tobacco, compared to just over 6 per cent in the South East.

In an attempt to protect the population from the harms of smoking, the four key interventions highlighted by Dr Khan in the review are:

The report