More teenagers are using e-cigarette products nationwide than in years prior, and Arkansas is no different.
A recent Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report shows that the use of e-cigarettes by high school students has increased by 78 percent this year. The number of users also rose. In 2011, 220, 000 students used e-cigarettes.
This year, the CDC predicts that number will reach over three million or 20.8 percent of all students.
The current number for students using e-cigarette products in Arkansas is 13.7 percent, even though Arkansas bans the selling of e-cigarettes to those under the age of 18.
Dr. Appathurai Balamurugan, the medical director for the Tobacco and Chronic Disease Branch for the Arkansas Department of Health, says while Arkansas conducts studies on tobacco use every two years and does not have data for this year, Arkansas is not far behind national numbers.
“We’ve increased from less than 2 percent in 2010 to close to 14 percent in 2017. So we believe that we are pretty much tracking the national average for e-cigarette use,” Balamurugan said.
The Food and Drug Administration recently proposed some new guidelines to curb the sale of tobacco and nicotine products to minors. One is requiring flavored electronic nicotine delivering products be sold in age-restricted stores.
The CDC credits the rising popularity of products like the JUUL as a factor of a higher e-cigarette use.
Balamurugan says companies that produce electronic nicotine devices are savvy with their marketing to teenagers.
“Most of the kids are now using social media: Facebook, Instagram or Snapchat and they are pervasive in all of these social media [platforms] and public events like ballgames or whatnot,” Balamurugan said.
Mint and menthol flavored e-cigarette products would be exempt from this guideline because they are more popular with adults than minors.
However, another FDA policy would ban menthol cigarettes and cigars entirely.
FDA commissioner Scott Gottlieb said in a statement that he believes menthol-flavored products are “one of the most common and pernicious routes by which kids initiate on combustible cigarettes.” Furthermore unlike menthol e-cigarettes, there is a lack of evidence to suggest menthol-flavored tobacco products help adults quit smoking.
The FDA statement also addressed flavored cigars, even proposing a policy to ban them.
Overall. Gottlieb said if implemented, these efforts would greatly impact the ability of teens to access these appealing and popular products and reduce their nicotine and tobacco use.
He also said if these policy changes do not help reverse this trend of increased e-cigarette use in minors, he will explore additional options.
According to the FDA, manufacturers do not need to wait for the implementation of these new policies to act. They could stop some marketing and sales practices immediately.