Public Health has told Channel 103 that it is 'seriously considering' banning today's children from ever being able to buy cigarettes legally.

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak announced similar plans earlier this week, saying he intends to raise the minimum age to buy tobacco by a year every year in England.

Smoking remains the biggest cause of preventable deaths in Jersey, with up to 1,000 hospital admissions linked to habit in 2020.

Director of Public Health Peter Bradley says the move is part of a 'number of strategies'.

"We are hoping to start this work early next year,.

Part of the reason (for the slight delay) is because we are currently focusing on vaping, which has been raised as a concern by many islanders."

The Environment Minister announced last month that the government wanted to bring in a ban for single-use vapes in Jersey, due to health and environmental concerns.

Mr Bradley says, although the rate of tobacco smoking has dropped, it's still high.

"We still have 15% of people smoking on the island, which is 1 in 7.

Studies have shown that 20% of year ten students have also tried smoking at some point."

Following the announcement from the UK Government, industry bosses say that it shouldn't be up to politicians to decide what people do.

Mr Bradley says that they need to balance protecting people's health and their freedom of choice.

"We need to be mindful of the different perspectives, and that is part of the reason why we won't rush into it, but have a conversation with islanders.

Ultimately we have to acknowledge that this is a major cause of hospital admissions, we need to consider things carefully, but there is an increasing argument for us to do something quite robust about smoking."