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Forum editorial: Don’t be fooled by e-cig hype

The North Dakota Legislature is buying into Big Tobacco’s clever but dishonest narrative about e-cigarettes. Lawmakers would be better served by paying attention to Dr. Terry Dwelle, the state’s chief health officer.
In comments published a few days ago, Dwelle said without equivocation that, given current research and information, the “cons” of e-cigs outweigh the “pros.” He said more work is needed to further define the risks and any potential benefits of the nicotine-delivery devices. He said the assumption that vapors produced by e-cigs are less risky than smoke from traditional tobacco products is not backed up by sound research.
Lawmakers likely will ban e-cig sales to minors, as several North Dakota cities have done already. But there is wrong-headed sentiment among some lawmakers that the devices should not be taxed and otherwise treated the same way tobacco is. Under the state’s smoking ban law, e-cigs are treated like cigarettes and other tobacco products. The e-cig provision was part of a voter-approved smoking and secondhand smoke measure. The measure passed with 66 percent approval.
Yet, lawmakers have smoke in their eyes when it comes to the clear message North Dakotans sent about tobacco use – and the stealth campaign to paint vaping with e-cigs as an innocent tobacco-free option.
There is nothing innocent about it. Big Tobacco has become Big Vaping. The companies have jumped into the e-cig market with slick advertising campaigns and legitimate-sounding claims about the safety and efficacy of e-cigarettes. The push has all the elements that peddlers of tobacco used a generation ago to convince the gullible that cigarettes did not cause cancer. The lie then has morphed into the lie now.
There is less-than-definitive indication that e-cigs help smokers quit. If it’s true, it’s a good thing. But that unproved aspect of e-cigs has nothing to do with taxing a nicotine-delivery device that by some studies can be a gateway for young people to tobacco use. It is counterintuitive to grant a tax break to devices and substances that use candy flavors and faux fashion to attract users of all ages to a nicotine-delivery tube. It’s also stupid policy. It’s playing into the dirty hands of the folks who for years peddled the fiction that tobacco was good for us.
Forum editorials represent the opinion of Forum management and the newspaper’s Editorial Board.
http://www.inforum.com/opinion/editorials/3711115-forum-editorial-dont-be-fooled-e-cig-hype

Letter: Support e-cigarette age restrictions

By Tom Woodmansee, Bismarck

House Bill 1265 would require e-vapor products (commonly referred to as e-cigarettes) to be sold only to adults 18 years of age and above, an important goal that we should all agree on. We support enactment of underage access prevention for e-vapors and alternative nicotine products, which is why we support House Bill 1265.
This bill includes broad definitions to ensure that these new product forms are included in North Dakota’s existing underage access prevention laws.
Products that contain nicotine, whether they are traditional tobacco products like cigarettes, cigars or smokeless tobacco or new e-vapor products, are for adults only. We don’t believe people who are under legal age should be purchasing these products. Currently, 41 states prohibit sale of e-vapor products to minors.
The bill would also establish statewide policy regarding sales of these new types of products such as e-vapor. This bill would provide uniform policy for e-vapor and alternative nicotine product sales across North Dakota and avoid a patchwork of differing local restrictions or ordinances that could cause confusion among adult consumers and retailers.
That’s why we support this legislation to help ensure that e-vapor products are only available to adult consumers and to support retailers in having uniform state standards for tobacco and alternative nicotine product sales to continue to help address underage access to all types of products that contain nicotine.
Let’s do the right thing and pass House Bill 1265. It’s the responsible approach that will help make these products only available to adults and out of kids’ hands.
Woodmansee is with the North Dakota Grocers Association.
http://www.inforum.com/letters/3684232-letter-support-e-cigarette-age-restrictions

Teen tobacco users likely to use it in multiple forms

By Reuters Media

A national survey of U.S. middle and high school students finds that those who use tobacco or nicotine products are likely to also use more than one type of product.

About 15 percent of the adolescents reported smoking cigarettes, cigars, pipes, bidis, hookahs or water pipes, using dissolvable forms of tobacco or “vaping” e-cigarettes. And twice as many in that group used two or more of these product types compared to those who said they used only one.

“Our study really shows that kids are using more than one of these products at the same time,” said Youn Ok Lee of RTI International in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, the report’s lead author.

Lee said there are many varieties of tobacco products available. And each type of product also has a diverse range of options, such as flavors.

“So we don’t really know a lot about how this range of products might affect kids’ use of tobacco,” she told Reuters Health.

Using data from a 2012 national survey of nearly 25,000 U.S. students, researchers found that about 7 percent reported using one tobacco product in the past 30 days. About 4 percent said they used two tobacco products in that time. Another 4 percent said they used three or more products.

“I was a little bit surprised by just how many kids were using more than one product,” Lee said. “Even more surprising was that using three or more products is more popular than using cigarettes alone.”

Overall, about 3 percent of kids exclusively used cigarettes and about 2 percent exclusively used cigars. Those products were the most popular and their use increased with age.

The study team also found that almost 1 percent of students reported exclusively using e-cigarettes, which contain no tobacco but deliver a vapor laced with nicotine, the addictive substance in tobacco.

That’s more than the 0.4 percent who reported using e-cigarettes in combination with traditional cigarettes.

The increasing popularity of e-cigarettes is a concern for U.S. health officials as use has tripled between 2013 and 2014.

Lee noted that the results don’t tell why young people are using more than one form of tobacco, or how often the survey participants had used the products.

The researchers did find that being a boy, using flavored products, being dependent on nicotine, being receptive to advertising and having friends who used any tobacco products were all factors linked to an increased risk of using more than one product.

Policymakers and researchers should look at how these products affect tobacco use among middle and high school students, said Lee, because little is known about the influence of non-cigarette products.

Moreover, these products may create a public health issue by introducing people who would never have smoked cigarettes to nicotine, she said.

Lee emphasized that it’s important to look at all tobacco products together – not individually.

SOURCE: http://bit.ly/1za0ykL Pediatrics, online February 2, 2015.

http://www.inforum.com/news/3671610-teen-tobacco-users-likely-use-it-multiple-forms

E-cigarettes may promote lung infections

By Dennis Thompson, HealthDay News

Vapor from electronic cigarettes may increase young people’s risk of respiratory infections, whether or not it contains nicotine, a new laboratory study has found.

Lung tissue samples from deceased children appeared to suffer damage when exposed to e-cigarette vapor in the laboratory, researchers reported in a recent issue of the journal PLOS One. The vapor triggered a strong immune response in epithelial cells, which are cells that line the inside of the lung and protect the organ from harm, said lead author Dr. Qun Wu, a lung disease researcher at National Jewish Health in Denver.

Once exposed to e-cigarette vapor, these cells also became more susceptible to infection by rhinovirus, the virus that’s the predominant cause of the common cold, the researchers found.

“Epithelial cells are the first line of defense in our airways,” Wu said. “They protect our bodies from anything dangerous we might inhale. Even without nicotine, this liquid can hurt your epithelial defense system, and you will be more likely to get sick.”

The new report comes amid a surge in the popularity of e-cigarettes, which are being promoted by manufacturers as a safer alternative to traditional tobacco cigarettes and a possible smoking-cessation aid.

Nearly 1.8 million children and teens in the United States had tried e-cigarettes by 2012, the study authors said in background information. Less than 2 percent of American adults had tried e-cigarettes in 2010, but by last year the number had topped 40 million, an increase of 620 percent.

For the study, researchers obtained respiratory system tissue from children aged 8 to 10 who had passed away and donated their organs to medical science. Researchers specifically looked for tissue from young donors because they wanted to focus on the effects of e-cigarettes on kids, Wu said.

The human cells were placed in a sterile container at one end of a machine, with an e-cigarette at the other end. The machine applied suction to the e-cigarette to simulate the act of using the device, with the vapors produced by that suction traveling through tubes to the container holding the human cells.

The vapor spurred the release of IL-6, a signaling protein that promotes inflammation and an immune system response. This occurred whether or not the vapor contained nicotine, although nicotine appeared to slightly enhance the release of IL-6, the researchers said.

The exposed lung tissue also appeared more susceptible to the common cold virus, developing higher amounts of virus compared to healthy cells that had not been exposed to the vapor, the investigators found. In follow-up testing, lab mice exposed to e-cigarette vapor also appeared more likely to come down with a cold from rhinovirus, compared with unexposed mice.

The American Vaping Association, an industry group representing e-cigarette makers, said the study findings were limited because the tests involved cells in a laboratory, not actual people using e-cigarettes. The tests also failed to compare the effects of the vapor to other inhalants, the group said.

“Many in public health agree that the risks of vaping must always be considered in the context of the risks of cigarette smoking and traditional stop-smoking therapies,” said Gregory Conley, president of the American Vaping Association.

“Unlike past studies, this study provides the reader with no data to compare the liquid results to. What would happen if these same cells were exposed to combustible cigarettes, nicotine gum, or the smoking cessation drug varenicline (Chantix)? That is an important — and unanswered — question that the authors don’t appear to have great interest in answering,” Conley said.

Dr. Norman Edelman, senior medical adviser for the American Lung Association, agreed that people should be cautious in drawing conclusions based on lab tests using cell cultures.

At the same time, Edelman said, the study findings are “interesting and provocative” and fit in with prior research on the effects of e-cigarette use.

“We already know that if you have someone smoke an e-cigarette and then test them, they show airway inflammation,” Edelman said. “The susceptibility to viral infection is brand new and interesting.”

http://www.chicagotribune.com/lifestyles/health/sc-health-0121-e-cigarette-infections-20150109-story.html

Major cancer groups call for e-cigarette research, regulation

By John Nielsen, ScienceInsider

One telling sign of the popularity of electronic cigarettes, or e-cigarettes, which allow users to inhale nicotine vapors without other harmful chemicals, arrived late last year: The editors of the Oxford Dictionaries declared “vape” their Word of the Year for 2014.

Today, e-cigarettes earned another kind of notice: Two of the largest cancer science and treatment groups in the United States called on the government to start regulating “electronic nicotine delivery systems” and step up research on the health effects of vaping.

“While e-cigarettes may reduce smoking rates and attendant adverse health risks, we will not know for sure until these products are researched and regulated,” said Peter Paul Yu, president of the 35,000-member American Society of Clinical Oncology, in a statement. “We are concerned that e-cigarettes may encourage nonsmokers, particularly children, to start smoking and develop nicotine addiction.” His group was joined by the American Association for Cancer Research, which has more than 33,000 members.

The joint statement endorsed the urgent need for new research into the health effects of e-cigarettes and using tobacco tax revenues to help fund studies. It also included a long list of recommended actions by state and federal government agencies. They include requiring makers of e-cigarettes to register their products with the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), to identify the chemicals and levels of nicotine in various brands, and to agree to help stop teenagers from vaping.

In April 2014, FDA issued a proposal to start regulating e-cigarettes. The proposal would require FDA reviews of e-cigarette products and force makers to stop claiming health benefits until the science is in. The rule would also ban the distribution of free samples of e-cigarettes and vending machine sales. Health warnings would be mandatory. FDA has not finalized the rules, however, and researchers and health professionals say they hope today’s statement will highlight the need to move quickly.

“As someone who runs a treatment program for tobacco addicts, I would love to be able to endorse the use of e-cigarettes as an alternative,” says Michael Steinberg of the Robert Wood Johnson Medical School at Rutgers University, New Brunswick, in New Jersey. “But I cannot do that because we don’t know the risks involved, nor can we be sure that moving to e-cigarettes really helps people stop smoking.” Steinberg says it could turn out that smokers who start vaping tend to end up using both e-cigarettes and flammable ones or that the nicotine produced by e-cigarettes is unexpectedly toxic.

Some researchers worry that any new rules won’t go far enough, soon enough. Neither the FDA proposal nor today’s joint statement calls for a ban on television advertising by e-cigarette makers, for example, notes Stanton Glantz, director of the Center for Tobacco Control Research and Education at the University of California, San Francisco. (Glantz, a frequent critic of the health claims made by makers of e-cigarettes, says he supports such a ban.) There’s also no mention of regulating e-cigarette “flavorings,” such as minty or fruity flavors, which were banned from cigarettes after they were linked to elevated smoking rates among teenagers.

Glantz also worries that it could be years before FDA fully regulates the devices. “It’s an especially torturous political and legal process at the federal level,” he says. Regulations may be easier to finalize on the state and local level, he adds, noting that several states and cities have already imposed restrictions. “I would look for progress at the local level,” Glantz says. “I expect that in this case the most important changes will start at the bottom, not the top.”

In the meantime, e-cigarettes are becoming increasingly mainstream. The small, battery-powered devices first became readily available in the United States in 2006, and sales rose to about $2 billion in 2014 alone. “Vaping” bars where people speak of “vapers’ rights” are popping up in towns and cities. Movie stars have advertised their vaping skills on late-night television talk shows.

This past December, a survey released by the National Institute on Drug Abuse reported that 17% of high school seniors said they’d vaped at least once a month, compared with 14% percent who admitted to smoking. Vaping among 10 graders, at 16%, was more than twice the rate of smoking. Antismoking activists found these reports alarming, arguing that vaping could become a “gateway habit” that could draw nonsmokers toward cigarette use.

http://news.sciencemag.org/health/2015/01/major-cancer-groups-call-e-cigarette-research-regulation

Forum editorial: Close off e-cig sales to minors

Fargo Forum Editorial

The Legislature should follow the lead of several North Dakota cities and ban the sale of e-cigarettes to minors. As it stands now, even with sales bans in Fargo, Bismarck, Casselton, Mapleton and other cities, e-cigs can be (and likely are being) sold to minors all over the state. It’s a gaping loophole in a state law that in every other way treats e-cigs like tobacco products.

E-cigs are touted as an effective option for tobacco users to get off cigarettes, although the research is inconclusive. But they also appeal to kids because they are used by some minors for “vaping,” which kids think is “cool,” according to public health experts. E-cigs don’t contain tobacco, but they can be nicotine delivery devices. Often the substances in e-cigs include candy flavors. There is little doubt the products are aimed at adolescents, according to new research. And kids are taking them up at alarming rates.

That being said, e-cig sellers in Fargo insist it is against company policy to sell to anyone under age 18, no matter what a state’s law or city’s ordinances allow or prohibit. In fact, e-cig retailers say they want a state law that bans sales to minors, and will work with legislators in the upcoming session.

While the retailers’ public attitude is good news, questions remain. Where are kids getting e-cigs? Why is use up among minors? Who is policing what?

Most troubling: There is no question e-cigs are a gateway to smoking among teens. New studies indicate that as more minors try e-cigs (up in several states), chances increase that they will try tobacco and get hooked. Nicotine, whether in an e-cig or a cigarette, is addictive. It should come as no surprise that big tobacco companies are in the e-cig business.

The state of North Dakota, with what appears to be support from e-cig sellers, should close the sales-to-minors loophole. Without informed and firm action, e-cigs could erode the progress that’s been made to reduce tobacco use in the 50 years since the first surgeon general’s report revealed the health risks of smoking.

Forum editorials represent the opinion of Forum management and the newspaper’s Editorial Board.

http://www.inforum.com/opinion/3637026-forum-editorial-close-e-cig-sales-minors

USA Today – Our View: E-cigarettes cloud progress on teen smoking

USA Today Editorial Board

E-cigarettes, once seen as a harmless alternative to tobacco smoking, are beginning to look more like a new gateway to addiction.

This year, for the first time, more teens used electronic cigarettes than traditional ones: 17% of high school seniors used the devices, vs. 14% who smoked cigarettes. Kids in eighth and 10th grades favored them 2-to-1 over traditional smokes, according to an eye-opening University of Michigan survey released Tuesday.

In one sense, there is good news. Teen smoking hit a record low last year after a steady decline since the late 1990s, leaving fewer teens vulnerable to the risk of cancer, heart disease and emphysema that comes with tobacco use. But e-cigarettes are a troubling alternative.

Just as scientists didn’t grasp the danger of tobacco when the nation was becoming addicted, they don’t fully understand the risks posed by e-cigarettes now.

One is obvious: addiction.

E-cigs, battery-powered nicotine inhalers that produce a vapor cloud, could be every bit as addictive as tobacco. With sales skyrocketing to $754 million, 30 times five-year-ago levels, and tobacco giants Altria and Reynolds entering the business, millions of people are getting hooked.

This is particularly a problem during the teen years because that is when nearly all smokers pick up their habit.

For manufacturers, the logic is inescapable: Addict a teenager and you could have a customer for life; miss the moment and you have no customer at all. So in ways subtle and not so subtle, e-cigarette makers have applied Big Tobacco’s advertising and marketing practices.

One prominent tactic is their use of celebrities — including former Playboy centerfold Jenny McCarthy, singer Courtney Love, actor Stephen Dorff and teen heartthrob Robert Pattinson of Twilight fame — to make “vaping” look sexy and rebellious.

No one knows how dangerous this is because with federal oversight missing, no one knows exactly what’s in the devices, some made in China. A Japanese study found hazardous substances in the vapor at higher levels than in cigarette smoke.

There are obvious ways to address the problem, starting with attention from the newly confirmed surgeon general, Vivek Murthy, and analysis by the Food and Drug Administration of e-cigarette content. Both worked with tobacco but could be thwarted by a Congress rigidly opposed to regulation.

Alternatively, states could fill the breach. Nearly a dozen still allow e-cigarette sales to minors when they plainly should not. They could also use the 1998 tobacco settlement negotiated with the industry long before e-cigarettes existed. The accord defines covered products in a way that includes e-cigarettes, because nicotine is derived from tobacco.

By invoking the settlement, state attorneys general would be able to clamp down on marketing that’s targeted at youth, including certain celebrity promotions, concert sponsorships and access to free samples.

After a decades-long battle against youth smoking, it would be tragic to see a new generation of teens hooked on a different but potentially dangerous substitute.

USA TODAY’s editorial opinions are decided by its Editorial Board, separate from the news staff. Most editorials are coupled with an opposing view — a unique USA TODAY feature.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2014/12/16/e-cigarettes-teen-smoking-university-of-michigan-editorials-debates/20485297/

Don't fall for tobacco industry e-cigarette smokescreen

By Michaeline Fedder, Deborah P. Brown and Bonita Pennino
No one should have to choose between their health and a paycheck. Which is why, with all that is still unknown about the dangers of e-cigarette use, we must put public health first and prohibit the use of these unregulated products in all workplaces, including restaurants, bars and casinos. Unfortunately a bill recently passed by the Baltimore City Council purporting to ban e-cigarette use in the city allows restaurants, taverns and casinos to opt out, which not only weakens Baltimore and Maryland’s longstanding and popular smoke-free laws, it threatens the health of many city workers. We urge Mayor Rawlings-Blake to see through the tobacco industry smokescreen and use her power to veto this ordinance.
Turning the clock back by allowing the use of e-cigarettes in public places could create a host of new problems — encouraging new tobacco users, reversing efforts that have made smoking socially unacceptable, creating enforcement confusion for business owners and the public, and potentially putting the health of Baltimore’s restaurant, bar and casino workers and patrons at risk.
While e-cigarette manufacturers may make unverified claims that the ingredients are just “water vapor” or “safe,” without further research and federal regulation there is no sure way for e-cigarette users to know what they are consuming. Nor is there any way of knowing what nonusers are exposed to and the extent of the risk to their health. There are hundreds of types of e-cigarettes on the market today, and the products vary considerably by ingredients and quality control and assurance. Prohibiting the use of e-cigarettes in workplaces, restaurants and bars can protect the public health by preventing nonusers from being exposed to the potentially harmful chemicals in these products.
An increasing number of studies have examined the contents of e-cigarette aerosol. Unlike a vapor, an aerosol contains fine particles of liquid, solid or both. Propylene glycol, nicotine and flavorings were most commonly found in e-cigarette aerosol. Other studies have found the aerosol to contain heavy metals, volatile organic compounds and tobacco-specific nitrosamines, among other potentially harmful chemicals. A 2009 study done by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) found cancer-causing substances in several of the e-cigarette samples tested. FDA tests also found nicotine in some e-cigarettes that claimed to contain no nicotine.
The public should know more about e-cigarettes before allowing users to expose others to potential dangers. Studies have already shown that the use of e-cigarettes can cause short-term lung changes and irritations, while the long-term health effects are unknown.Both exposure to and health effects of secondhand aerosol from e-cigarettes require further research, but preliminary studies indicate nonusers can be exposed to the same potentially harmful chemicals as users, including nicotine, ultrafine particles and volatile organic compounds. This exposure could be especially problematic for vulnerable populations such as children, pregnant women and people with heart disease. No worker or patron should be subject to inhaling the unknown aerosol emitted from electronic smoking devices.
By passing this reckless measure allowing the use of e-cigarettes in workplaces, Baltimore City Council members have fallen for the tobacco industry’s tricks. We are all too familiar with the age-old tactics of the tobacco industry such as designating smoking areas and notifying the public when smoking is allowed. We learned the hard way that these strategies do nothing to protect the health of workers and patrons from the dangers of secondhand smoke. These tactics are nothing but a ruse to promote smoking in public places, thus continuing addiction to a deadly product and guaranteeing sales of cigarettes well into the future. We should not repeat the same mistake now in Baltimore with e-cigarettes. No one, regardless in which section of a restaurant, tavern or casino they are working, dining or gaming, should have to choose between their health and a good job or a good time.
It is well understood that smoke-free laws are popular in Maryland and should not be weakened. And laws prohibiting the use of e-cigarettes in public places are steadily on the rise — with 156 municipalities and counting already prohibiting the use of e-cigarettes in all workplaces, including restaurants, bars and gaming facilities. Everyone has the right to breathe safe smoke-free and aerosol-free air in their place of work or leisure, and Mayor Rawlings-Blake should protect that right by vetoing this ordinance.
Michaeline Fedder is director of government relations in Maryland for the American Heart Association; Deborah P. Brown is president and CEO of the American Lung Association of the Mid-Atlantic; Bonita Pennino is the Maryland government relations director for the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network.

Our View: Do more to keep e-cigs, youths apart

The Times Editorial Board, SC Times

Surveys of Minnesota and U.S. youth show alarming increase in e-cigarette use. Lawmakers can slow this increase by immediately acting to limit access.

Two surveys released the past week — one state and one national — deliver a powerful message about the most pressing issue regarding e-cigarettes:
Government needs to lead a stronger charge to keep them out of the hands — and bodies — of minors.
To this point, most of the e-cigarette debate has been about whether e-cigarettes — which electronically convert liquid nicotine into vapor to be inhaled — are as harmful as traditional tobacco and secondhand smoke.
That debate has raged for years, even decades. A resolution seems months, or more likely, years away.
What’s more pressing to resolve — as evidenced by two surveys of youths’ nicotine use — is slowing the fast-rising number of minors who are trying these devices.
How fast?
The 2014 Minnesota Youth Tobacco Survey released Monday found 28 percent of high school students have tried e-cigarettes. On Thursday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported 4.5 percent of high school students nationally used e-cigarettes regularly in 2013 — triple the percent from 2011. Equally disturbing: 12 percent of U.S. high school students and 3 percent of middle-schoolers had tried them at least once.
And remember, e-cigarettes have been widely available in America for only about seven years.
Such findings make it clear e-cigarettes hold potential for creating countless new generations with unhealthy and high rates of nicotine addiction.
Hasn’t America learned enough hard lessons from 50 years of tobacco-based nicotine addiction to know it needs to snuff out that potential now instead of waiting for more research?
Ultimately, there is no debate that nicotine is a potent, addictive drug. E-cigarettes are simply a delivery mechanism.
So lawmakers should act now to keep the drug and the delivery system out of the hands of minors.
An easy decision is to enact a federal ban on selling minors e-cigarettes, “e-juice” and related products. Minnesota is one of about 35 states with such bans. However, sales via the Internet still provide youth access.
Another important step is to apply the same rules to the marketing of e-cigarettes that are applied to traditional tobacco.
After all, even a cursory glance at products and advertising makes it clear many producers are targeting youth. Think everything from trendy-looking e-cigarettes (and accessories) to bubble-gum flavored e-juice.
Finally, there is merit in increasing the taxes paid on all e-cigarette products.
Such an approach proved successful in reducing youth use of traditional tobacco. And it might even dissuade adults from nicotine addiction.
Again, too much of the debate about whether and how to regulate e-cigarettes remains focused on comparisons to traditional tobacco.
Seeing how e-cigarettes are gaining traction among youth, the focus needs to shift to keeping these nicotine-delivery devices out of their hands — at least until they are legal adults.
http://www.sctimes.com/story/opinion/2014/11/16/view-keep-e-cigs-youths-apart/19089759/

CDC: E-Cigarette Use Rising in High School Kids

By MIKE STOBBE AP Medical Writer
Use of electronic cigarettes by high school students tripled over three years, according to a new government report released Thursday.
In a large national survey last year, 4.5 percent of high school students said they had used e-cigarettes in the previous month. That’s up from 1.5 percent in 2011 and 2.8 percent in 2012.
It’s not known, though, how many were repeatedly using e-cigarettes and how many only tried it once during that month and didn’t do it again.
E-cigarettes began to appear in the United States in late 2006, but marketing has exploded in recent years. The devices heat liquid nicotine into a vapor. They are often described as a less dangerous alternative to regular cigarettes, but experts say nicotine — including the nicotine in e-cigarettes — is especially harmful to children.
Dozens of states outlaw the sale of e-cigarettes to minors, and federal officials have proposed a nationwide ban on such sales.
The report’s e-cigarette findings are disheartening, said Dr. Patrick T. O’Gara, president of the American College of Cardiology. Smoking rates has slowly been declining over the last several decades, but “we risk going backwards if a new generation of smokers becomes addicted to nicotine,” O’Gara said, in a statement.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report comes from a survey of more than 18,000 high school and middle school students.
The CDC survey also found 13 percent of high school students recently smoked regular cigarettes, and that about 23 percent used some form of tobacco product — be it cigarettes, e-cigarettes, flavored cigars, hookahs or something else.
http://abcnews.go.com/Health/wireStory/cdc-cigarette-rising-high-school-kids-26893757