A Year of Progress, But Youth E-Cigarette Use Still At Epidemic Levels
25% of Americans Protected by Laws Banning Flavored E-Cigarettes
In response to alarming levels of e-cigarette use among youth in the United States, Bloomberg Philanthropies on September 10, 2019, announced the creation of a $160 million initiative to end the youth e-cigarette epidemic, focused on prohibiting the flavored e-cigarettes that have driven this crisis. The initiative – Protect Kids: Fight Flavored E-Cigarettes – is led by the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, partnering with other organizations.
One year later, we can report significant progress, but youth e-cigarette use remains at epidemic levels and bold action is needed at all levels of government to prohibit flavored e-cigarettes and stop tobacco companies from addicting a new generation of kids. Learn more from our Progress Report.
Newly-released results of the 2020 National Youth Tobacco Survey show a meaningful decline in youth tobacco use in 2020, but one in five high school students and 3.6 million kids altogether still use e-cigarettes. 83% of them use flavored products. And 39% of high school e-cigarette users use these products at least 20 days a month, a sure sign of addiction.
The drop in youth e-cigarette use has been driven by a number of factors, including remarkable progress at the state and local levels in prohibiting flavored e-cigarettes:
- Five states – California, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York and Rhode Island – and dozens of cities have enacted policies ending the sale of flavored e-cigarettes.
- These laws protect 25% of the U.S. population – 81.4 million people altogether, including 17.7 million kids.
The Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids will keep fighting until all flavored e-cigarettes are off the market and we’ve stopped tobacco companies from targeting kids once and for all.