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A pile of used or discarded Vape Pens has been found strewn about the streets of New York City.
Lindsey Nicholson | Global Image Collection | Getty Images
Efforts to restrict teens’ preferred e-cigarette flavors may have eased as new brands hit the market, a new report says.
In recent years, electronic cigarettes flavored with fruits, candy, spices and sweets have spread, which have always been popular among underage smokers. data It was analyzed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the CDC Foundation and the Truth Initiative.
The organizations found that flavored e-cigarettes accounted for 41.3% of US retailer e-cigarette unit sales in December 2022, up from 29.2% in January 2020. Overall e-cigarette sales in the US increased about 47% in the period.
The increase in sales comes despite a federal campaign to place more restrictions on flavorings and marketing of tobacco products.
“The dramatic spikes in youth e-cigarette use in 2017 and 2018, driven primarily by JUUL, show just how quickly e-cigarette sales and usage patterns can change,” said Deirdre Lawrence Keitner, director of the CDC’s Office on Smoking and Health. . “Retail sales data is key to providing real-time information about the rapidly changing e-cigarette landscape, which is critical to reducing youth tobacco use.”
Citing the appeal of flavored e-cigarettes to children, the Food and Drug Administration announced in January 2020 that it would ban sales of sweet and fruity pre-filled e-cigarette pods, leading to the demise of major brands like Juul and Vuse.
During the period from January 2020 to December 2022, the unit share of pre-filled cartridges decreased from 75.2% to 48.0%.
However, the flavor restrictions did not affect disposable cigarettes, which at the end of 2019 accounted for only 15% of e-cigarette unit sales in US retail stores, according to the data. From January 2022 to December 2022, the share of disposable e-cigarette unit sales increased from 24.7% to 51.8% of total unit sales.
They now account for more than half of the e-cigarette market in the United States.
Nicotine is highly addictive and can harm a teen’s brain, which continues to develop until about age 25, according to the CDC. Furthermore, the agency found that most of the popular brands of disposable e-cigarettes on the market — Puff Bar, Elf Bar, and Breeze Smoke — are not FDA-approved and illegal. The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has only authorized the NJOY daily disposable e-cigarette brand, which comes in two tobacco flavors.
Last year, the FDA removed Elf Bar and Breeze Smoke from the US market, according to a CDC report.
“The tobacco industry is well aware that flavors attract and attract children, and that young people are uniquely vulnerable to nicotine addiction,” said Robin Koval, CEO and President of the Truth Initiative. “While we are encouraged by recent actions by the Food and Drug Administration to reduce illegal marketing of flavored e-cigarettes, we must all work with greater urgency to protect our nation’s youth from all flavored e-cigarettes, including disposables.”
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