Doctors concerned about rise in pregnant women vaping in Buckinghamshire

Michelle East, the director of midwifery at Buckinghamshire Healthcare NHS Trust, said: “One of the interventions we offer to reduce tobacco dependency is vaping. It is currently seen as a suitable alternative for nicotine replacement in pregnancy.”

The health chief told the meeting she did not have the data about the number of pregnant women using vapes to hand but could provide this at a later date.

Data for the first quarter of 2024 to 2025 shows the rate of women in Bucks smoking at the time of delivery was 4.3 per cent a decrease of 22 per cent over two years.

Dr Karen West, a GP, told the meeting: “Our concerns are that although smoking is decreasing in general, vaping might be increasing, which is of some concern.”

Ms East said the harmful chemicals in tobacco had the biggest impact on stillbirths and premature births, and that vaping was considered a way to mitigate these, adding that there were not any ‘robust’ studies on how pregnancy is impacted by vaping.

Angela Macpherson, the council’s deputy leader and cabinet member for health and wellbeing, said: “I think there’s quite a lot we still don’t know about vaping. It is quite early days but there’s definitely concerns about it.”

Louise Hurst, the council’s director of public health said vaping was not ‘safe per se’, but was safer than smoking.