Restrictions on vaping are often predicated on the idea that they protect children and teenagers from a vaping “epidemic.” Despite the claim of an “epidemic,” fewer teens are vaping now than before the COVID-19 pandemic. Even with falling teen vaping rates, regulators are slow to approve and quick to ban vaping products for adult consumers, making it more difficult for smokers to quit and removing a choice that could help them live longer, healthier lives.

One argument made to justify the heavy-handed regulations on vaping products is that vaping may be a gateway to cigarettes for teens. However, the evidence shows that vaping has done the opposite. Teen vaping rates did rise from 2012 to 2019, but teen smoking rates also plummeted, leaving the combined total nearly the same. Despite almost the same total use rate, the switch means far less harm done, given that vaping is only 5 percent as harmful as smoking. In fact, smoking rates among high school seniors dropped from 19.5 percent of students to only 3.4 percent.

While teens shouldn’t vape or smoke, the problem of underage use is not new. The only difference is vaping is not as damaging as ignition-based smoking. While still not ideal, as addictive substances like nicotine influence the development of teenagers’ brains, more can and should be done to enforce existing laws against youth access to nicotine products. However, limiting or banning vapes doesn’t remove the problem of youth nicotine use. It pushes those kids that slip through the cracks back to cigarettes, a far more harmful option.

Unfortunately, the Food and Drug Administration and many state regulators either limit or ban vaping products outright, often to protect kids. Despite good intentions, such restrictions not only create harmful incentives for teens to return to ignition-based products but also create problems for adults by limiting their options to quit smoking.

The FDA has limited the availability of legally regulated vaping products by refusing to approve new ones, especially flavored ones. According to the House Oversight Committee, many of the FDA’s decisions on what to approve are arbitrary and based on politics instead of science. The same committee found that the FDA had missed deadlines to review premarket applications for vaping products and was not forthcoming with information about its product approval process, leaving companies frequently wondering whether their products would even meet FDA’s standards. Adult consumers also must guess which vaping products have been approved for use and which are yet to be approved since the FDA is also lax in its policing of unregulated products.

State and local governments have implemented sweeping bans on the sale of flavored vape products, and sometimes all vaping products, making it more difficult for adult smokers to find alternatives to cigarettes. Their motivation appears to be to keep vapes out of the hands of teens. However, teens don’t report flavors as a major reason for vaping. However, flavors are important to adults switching from cigarettes to vaping. Studies have routinely shown that vape products can help people quit smoking, with flavored vape products being particularly effective at getting smokers to stop.

Unlike federal, state and local regulators in the United States, the National Health Service in the United Kingdom recognizes vaping as being the most effective method of helping people to quit smoking. The NHS also acknowledges that, while vaping has health risks, the risks are far smaller than smoking. The Royal College of Physicians found vaping to have only 5 percent of the health risks of smoking, which is unsurprising given that vaping products don’t contain the thousands of chemicals in cigarette smoke. By embracing the latest scientific research on vaping, the United Kingdom has seen a major drop in smoking rates, with vaping playing a “major role.” The United States would be wise to learn from the United Kingdom’s example and join in its success at reducing smoking rates.

There is no debate that nicotine products of all kinds should be kept out of the hands of children and teenagers, but putting barriers in the way of adults who want to quit smoking won’t help. Instead, it will cost American consumers years off their lives.

Justin Leventhal is a senior policy analyst for the American Consumer Institute. He wrote this for InsideSources.com.

Newsletter