Keeping Teenagers Away from E-cigarettes, the U.S. FDA Means Business

This week, U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Commissioner Scott Gottlieb said he would work to push forward a ban on menthol in conventional cigarettes.

All flavored tobacco products would be classified as illegal goods, and regulations on the many flavored e-cigarette products sold on the market would also be tightened.

At first glance, this may look like an ordinary news story. But what you may not realize is that this move represents a powerful strike by the FDA after decades of repeated setbacks in efforts to reduce smoking rates in the United States.

The first target is e-cigarettes: keeping teenagers away from e-cigarettes.

According to statistics, about half of teenagers who use menthol and flavored e-cigarettes are a major factor behind the recent rise in teen vaping rates. Over the past year, the proportion of teenagers who smoke has risen by 78%! There was also a previous NIDA survey:

In the United States, the rate of cigarette smoking was 3.6% among 8th graders, 6.3% among 10th graders, and 11.4% among 12th graders. For e-cigarette use, the rates were 9.5% among 8th graders, 14.0% among 10th graders, and 16.2% among 12th graders.

E-cigarette usage rates are much higher. Moreover, boys use e-cigarettes twice as often as girls.

Even more alarming is this: when these minors are asked what e-cigarettes actually are—

66% of them answer: they’re just something that tastes good!

The rest either do not know or think they are marijuana... Only 13% know that e-cigarettes almost always contain nicotine.

And in recent years, e-cigarettes have become very popular. With all kinds of flavors, low prices, and the convenience of being easy to buy almost anywhere, more and more American teenagers are using them.

Compared with conventional cigarettes, these battery-powered e-cigarettes are more popular among teenagers and are often seen as relatively safer products. But many versions of e-cigarettes contain addictive nicotine, and teenagers who try e-cigarettes may eventually go on to smoke traditional cigarettes.

Smoking is one of the leading causes of disease in the United States, killing more than 480,000 people every year.

Scott Gottlieb said: I will never allow the younger generation to become addicted to nicotine because of e-cigarettes. With that determination—

The FDA recently issued a ban prohibiting the sale of e-cigarettes and tobacco products to minors under the age of 18.

Although it may take years for the full plan to take shape, regulatory changes related to e-cigarettes will be implemented in the coming months.

The measures prohibit direct sales of e-cigarettes to minors and require stronger safeguards for online e-cigarette sales to ensure they are not sold to underage buyers. At the same time, he also proposed a series of actions aimed at making sure convenience stores and certain retailers do not sell flavored e-cigarettes that appeal to teenagers. The FDA is investigating several companies in the e-cigarette market, including market leader Juul Labs Inc., headquartered in San Francisco. Before the FDA made this announcement, Juul had already stopped supplying flavored refill products such as mango, fruit, creme, and cucumber on Tuesday, and required retailers to scan IDs when selling products to confirm that buyers were at least 21 years old. The company said it would continue to sell menthol products offline and continue selling various flavors online.

In fact, the authorities banned a series of child-appealing flavored cigarettes back in 2009. But after intense lobbying by tobacco companies, menthol was excluded. This time, however, it may no longer escape inclusion.

Although the number of smokers in the United States has been declining over the past 50-plus years, about 42% of adults smoked in the 1960s. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), that figure dropped to 14% last year.

So hopefully smoking-cessation education can continue, and policies can be introduced to stop minors from being allowed to buy freely. That is what it really means for society to take responsibility for its young people.