Leading health experts in the county have welcomed radical changes aimed at making tobacco less glamorous.

A major change to the way tobacco is packaged is to be introduced to help deter people from smoking and to save lives.

Hertfordshire County Council's director of public health, Teresa Heritage, said the changes were intended to make smoking less appealing generally, but especially to more impressionable youngsters.

“Standardised packaging will reduce the visual identity and appeal of tobacco packaging as an advertisement for the product and support the drive to reduce the number of young people who smoke," she said.

From tomorrow, cigarettes and other tobacco products will have to be produced in packaging that has a drab olive colour, which has been considered the most off-putting to existing and potential smokers.

Manufacturers’ brand information on the packaging will have to follow a standardised specification and there will be a compulsory increase in the size of graphically explicit health warnings.

The changes will not be introduced straightaway, however.

Manufacturers can continue selling products produced in existing packaging for a further year.

Other changes are intended to make cigarettes less attractive from an economic standpoint.

This will include requiring all cigarette packets to contain at least 20 cigarettes, outlawing the practice of having 19, 18, or even 17 cigarettes in a pack to make the shelf price appear more appealing.

The change will also spell the end of the more affordable packets of 10 cigarettes.

In addition, hand-rolling tobacco will be packaged in minimum 30 gram pouches, to ensure that purchase prices are maintained at a higher level.

Most additives and flavouring are also being removed from tobacco products with the exception of the more popular menthol which will be allowed to be produced and sold until 2020.

Increased health warnings on packaging of e-cigarettes are also being introduced.