Teen vaping continues to be a public health crisis. For evidence, look no further than new data released by the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on youth e-cigarette use.
The study, drawn from the 2022 National Youth Tobacco Survey, found that an alarming number of adolescents regularly use these harmful, addictive products. The FDA will need to respond forcefully.
According to the paper, 9.4 percent of middle and high schoolers — more than 2.5 million young people — reported using e-cigarettes in the month before taking the survey. That includes approximately 14 percent of high school students. This finding might be lower than the whopping 28 percent of high schoolers reported in 2019, but it is still far too many. E-cigarettes can contain substantial amounts of nicotine, which can harm adolescents’ cognitive development and raise the risk of addiction.
Researchers warn that assessing trends over time is fraught, because the pandemic affected data collection. Nevertheless, the findings raise worrisome questions for regulators. Nearly 30 percent of young people who reported using e-cigarettes said they consumed these products daily, and approximately 85 percent consumed flavored e-cigarettes, which can come in sweet flavors designed to appeal to youths. In 2020, the FDA prohibited flavors in refillable cartridge-based products, but allowed disposable devices to continue to be sold in flavors such as “banana ice” and “cool mint.” Teens’ preferences appear to have shifted as a result: Single-use devices are now the most popular among teens, with fruit and candy flavors especially prevalent.
Recognizing those dangers, the FDA has attempted to crack down, with some responses more successful than others. The centerpiece of the agency’s strategy was its long-awaited partial ban on flavored products in 2020. Yet the final rule included many exceptions — not only for disposable devices but also e-liquids in other forms.
The new survey data should prompt regulators to close as many of those loopholes as they can. They should also vigorously enforce existing rules, including by imposing financial penalties on bad actors. The agency received some help from Congress this year, when lawmakers gave the FDA new authority to regulate products that used synthetic nicotine. In a statement this month, the FDA announced it had sent a warning letter to Puff Bar — the most popular e-cigarette brand among teens today, which uses synthetic nicotine — and denied marketing orders for 32 e-cigarettes from another company, Hyde. This is a start, but the agency should quickly finish reviewing pending e-cigarette applications and double down on getting illegal products off the shelves and streets.
Until most flavored products are taken off the market, teenagers will continue to consume them. Don’t be fooled by the colorful packaging and innocuous names. It is past time to protect children from the lifelong health and behavioral risks associated with adolescent vaping.
Editorial Board – Washington Post – 2022-10-16
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