Results of New Study Refute E-Cigarette Gateway Hypothesis as Well as Claim that Youth Vaping is Re-Normalizing Smoking

The results of a newstudy published late last week in the journalTobacco Control strongly refute the hypothesis that e-cigarettes are a gateway to smoking and that vaping is re-normalizing smoking among youth.(See: Miech R, Patrick ME, O ' Malley PM, Johnston LD. What are kids vaping? Results of a national survey of US adolescents.Tob Control. Published online ahead of print on August 25, 2016. doi: 10.1136/tobaccocontrol-2016-053014.)The study reports results from the 2015Monitoring the Future survey, as study of a nationally representative sample of U.S. youth in grades 8, 10, and 12. The sample size was approximately 15,000.The key result of the study was that the vast majority of youth who had used electronic cigarettes reporting having used e-liquids that only contained flavoring, but not nicotine. A much smaller proportion of youth reported using e-liquids containing nicotine. For example, among 12th graders who had ever vaped, 65% reported using e-liquids with just flavoring, while just 22% reported using e-liquids containing nicotine. Overall, fewer than one-fourth of adolescents who had experimented with e-cigarettes reported using nicotine-containing vaping products.The study summarizes its main finding as follows:" Among students who had ever used a vaporiser in their life, the portion who used ‘just flavouring’ the last time they vaped was greater than all other substances combined. This response was markedly consistent across g...
Source: The Rest of the Story: Tobacco News Analysis and Commentary - Category: Addiction Source Type: blogs