E-cigarette Use Rate Among Middle School Students Exceeds That of College Students: Why Is It So Eas

Do you smoke? Maybe you don't smoke, but there must be someone around you who smokes. According to WHO data, my country has the largest number of smokers in the world, with a total of 358 million smokers. Based on my country's population of 1.4 billion, there is about every 4 people. There is a smoker.

Smoking is harmful to health and is the most harmful to the respiratory tract. It not only harms human health, but also has adverse effects on society. Compared with adults, minors 'physical development is not yet mature, and smoking causes greater harm.

May 31, 2023 is the 36thWorld No Tobacco Day, the theme is "Smoke-free escorts growth", which aims to mobilize the whole society to actively participate in tobacco control and create a smoke-free, clean and healthy growth environment for young people.

Compared with traditional cigarettes, in recent years,e-cigarettesWith the popularity of e-cigarettes, many teenagers regard smoking e-cigarettes as a fashionable behavior, and e-cigarettes are also chaotic when they are sold, opening the door to young people to buy e-cigarettes.

Smoking rate among Chinese population and male smoking rate

Both are higher than the global average

Take one for leisure after meals, one for work, and one for games. No matter what the scene is, smokers can seize the opportunity to puff smoke, mainly seeking comfort at will, in an attempt to use tobacco. The sensory stimulation brought by relaxing nerves and filling the void.# p#pagination title #e#

Even though tobacco control actions are becoming more and more clear, the base of smokers in my country is still huge. According to comprehensive data from the WHO and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the number of smokers in my country is as high as 358 million, making it the country with the largest number of smokers in the world. The number of passive smokers reaches 740 million. The smoking rate among people over the age of 15 is 26.6%, and the smoking rate among men is 50.5%. Both data are higher than the global average.

Compared with the previous ten years, the smoking rate among our country's population has dropped, but the overall smoking rate remains at a high level. The use of e-cigarettes is currently on the rise in my country, especially among young people. At the same time, the smoking rate among young people aged 15 - 24 in my country is also rising.

Although the public's health awareness has greatly improved in the past few years due to the COVID-19 epidemic, many people have the willingness to quit smoking, but because of the large base of smokers, the impact of smoking is still far-reaching. According to the "China Smoking Health Hazard Report 2020", more than 1 million people lose their lives due to tobacco every year in my country. If no effective action is taken, it is expected that the number will increase to 2 million per year by 2030.

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A large-scale study based on our population published in The Lancet in 2022 showed that smoking increases the risk of 56 diseases and death from 22 diseases. Among the top eight causes of death in the world, 6 are related to smoking. Half of those who still smoke will die prematurely due to smoking. The average life expectancy of smokers is 10 years shorter than that of non-smokers.

E-cigarette usage among middle school students

Higher than college students

The theme of this year's No Tobacco Day emphasizes the important impact of tobacco control on young people. It is hoped that a youth tobacco control protection network can be built through multiple measures. Judging from the current situation, the smoking situation of young people in my country is not optimistic and it is in a prominent position in the world.

In 2018, the smoking rate among teenagers in my country was 6.9%, and the attempted smoking rate was 19.9%. There were still 180 million children suffering from secondhand smoke."It is difficult for teenagers to smoke." The younger you smoke, the more difficult it will be to quit smoking in the future.

A survey conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on student groups shows that in 2021, the proportion of middle school students in my country who currently smoke cigarettes is 4.7%, the overall proportion of trying to smoke cigarettes is as high as 16.7%, and the current smoking rate of college students is 7.8%. From the perspective of data ratio, female middle school students smoke higher than female college students.

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Why is smoking so serious among students?

According to a survey by China Youth Daily, more than half of teenagers smoke because they are influenced by their peers around them, and 48.5% believe that it is because teenagers regard smoking as a "sign" of growing up.

There are a large number of smokers in our country, and the smoking situation among young people is inseparable from the current environment. Compared with adults, young people have not yet established their own world outlook and values, so they will actively imitate others. Smoking by their parents at home, including people in the surrounding environment, will affect the smoking situation of young people.

In addition to social factors, young people smoke is serious, and there are also management reasons. Although our country prohibits smoking by minors and prohibits the sale of cigarettes to minors, in many cases such regulations will become a dead letter. With the development of online shopping platforms, minors have more opportunities to buy cigarettes.

This is also related to the development of e-cigarettes. We can also see from the research conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that the current use rate of e-cigarettes is 3.6% among middle school students and even 2.5% among college students. The proportion of middle school students who have used e-cigarettes in 2021 will be 16.1%, and the proportion of using e-cigarettes now is 3.6%, an increase of 3.5 and 0.8 percentage points respectively compared with 2019.

"The number of people aged 15 and above using e-cigarettes in my country is about 10 million. The majority of people using e-cigarettes are young people, and the age group aged 15-24 has the highest usage rate. The main way to obtain e-cigarettes is now through the Internet, accounting for 45.4%." Xiao Lin, a researcher at the Tobacco Control Office of the China Center for Disease Control and Prevention, said recently.# p#pagination title #e#

The sales chaos of e-cigarettes

Give teenagers more ways to buy

About 20 years ago, the first e-cigarettes were born. The development of e-cigarettes has been relatively slow for a long time since then. However, in the past five or six years, e-cigarettes have moved from a niche subculture to public life. According to data from the US CDC, the penetration rate of e-cigarette users among smokers in my country has increased rapidly since 2020, reaching about 2.2% by the end of 2021.

Advocates of e-cigarettes have created a market of tens of billions. Ai media data shows that in 2021, my countrye-cigarette industryThe market size of the company has reached 14.5 billion yuan and is expected to reach 45.43 billion yuan in 2023. Data from the "2021 Electronic Cigarette Industry Blue Book" shows that as of the end of 2021, there were more than 1500 e-cigarette manufacturing and brand-related companies in my country.

There are currently tens of thousands of types of e-cigarettes on the market, including various fruit, food, and beverage flavors. They are aimed at the young people's market, among which online marketing is particularly powerful.

It smells good and smells fashionable and handsome. E-cigarettes are extremely confusing to young people. College students can more or less master some knowledge, so compared with college students, the proportion of middle school students who lack a clear understanding of e-cigarettes is higher.# p#pagination title #e#

Since its birth, some people have regarded e-cigarettes as a safe alternative to traditional cigarettes. Some even claim that e-cigarettes are not addictive or carcinogenic, causing many young people to regard smoking e-cigarettes as a fashion. In fact, according to a study conducted by the University of Wisconsin, e-cigarettes are as harmful to the heart as traditional cigarettes.

According to today's news from Science and Technology Daily, one of the main components of the cigarette liquid used in most e-cigarettes is nicotine. Nicotine is the main substance for addiction to tobacco products such as cigarettes. Therefore, e-cigarettes are not only not a "smoking cessation artifact", but also after use. It will make people addicted.

In addition to nicotine, e-cigarettes also contain carbonyl compounds such as formaldehyde and acetaldehyde, as well as nitrosamines unique to tobacco. These are all carcinogens clearly listed by the International Organization for Research on Cancer and can cause harm to the respiratory tract. In addition, aerosols produced when e-cigarettes are heated also contain toxic substances, and the content may be higher than that in cigarette smoke.

Xiao Dan, director of the Tobacco Biology and Smoking Cessation Center of the China-Japan Friendship Hospital and executive director of the World Health Organization Collaborative Center on Smoking Cessation and Respiratory Disease Prevention, said that nicotine in e-cigarettes will affect the brain development of teenagers, and this effect will last until around the age of 25; The use of e-cigarettes during adolescence will have an impact on teenagers 'attention, learning, mood swings and impulse control, resulting in decreased attention and memory, increased impulsiveness and anxiety.

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The chaos in e-cigarette sales is also an important reason for the high smoking rate among teenagers. You can place orders online without looking at your ID card. These are loopholes in which teenagers can easily purchase e-cigarettes.

Although the country has long issued repeated orders to ban the sale of e-cigarettes to minors and ban the online sales of e-cigarettes, it is not ideal in terms of monitoring results, and the practice of peddling e-cigarettes to minors still exists. Data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows that among students who use e-cigarettes, the proportion of students who have not been rejected the most recent purchase of e-cigarettes is as high as 70.8%. That is to say, more than 70% of students can successfully purchase e-cigarettes.

Among all types of e-cigarette websites, only 43.3% have restrictions on the user's entry age. Although there are pop-up windows asking about the user's age, no website has specific verification requirements;76% do not have any health warning statements. Although some websites have health warning information, the information is relatively vague and the warning strength is insufficient.

In May 2022, the state officially implemented the "Measures for the Management of Electronic Cigarettes", which clearly prohibits the sale of flavored e-cigarettes other than tobacco flavors and e-cigarettes that can be added with self-atomized substances, and prohibits the sale to minors.e-cigarette productsHowever, according to media reports, there are still underground markets selling fruit-flavored e-cigarettes after the ban, and ID information is not required when purchasing.