Vaping 101

Welcome to Vaping 101. As a physician and a parent, I know that you have questions about vaping. This comprehensive guide was designed to answer all of your questions and more – it will educate you on vaping and arm you with the information you need to educate your family and friends in hopes that they decide to stop or, hopefully, never even start to use electronic cigarettes. This guide contains a review of the latest research and surveys to provide the most accurate information, but more importantly, we break it down into plain language so that you and your teens (or young adults) will both be able to understand why vaping is such a dangerous activity. We have spent the past several months educating the public at town hall gatherings. After speaking with hundreds of school nurses, teachers, students, and concerned parents about the vaping epidemic, we are confident that this guide will answer all your questions. The vaping epidemic is real.

The 2021 National Youth Tobacco Survey (NYTS) indicated that two million middle and high school students reported e-cigarette use at least once in the previous 30 days. Among high school students who admitted to vaping, nearly 45% reported at least every-other-day use and 27.6% reported daily use[i]. The survey allowed students to indicate their e-cigarette brand of choice with the following results: 26.1% of high school students indicated Puff Bar was their usual brand, 10.8% reported Vuse, 9.6% preferred SMOK, and 5.7% chose JUUL. 15.6% of high school users reported not knowing what brand they used. Among middle school users, 30.3% reported their regular brand was Puff Bar, 12.5% preferred JUUL, and 19.3% indicated not knowing the brand they used regularly. Among all users of all types of e-cigarettes (disposables, cartridge or pod type, or refillable tanks) the top flavors reported were fruit, followed by candy, desserts, or other sweets.

The NYTS survey conducted in 2022 revealed that 16.5% of high school students indicated they used a tobacco product within the previous 30 days[i]. In other words, if your teenage child invited over six friends, one of those friends may have used a tobacco product in the previous month. 14% of high school students specifically indicated vaping as their tobacco delivery vehicle, meaning that one in seven high school kids is vaping actively. For middle school children, the rate of kids using tobacco products was 1 in 21 children, slightly less than 5%.

Over three million children in the survey admitted to tobacco use in the previous month, and two out of every three teenage tobacco users reported electronic cigarettes or vape devices as the nicotine delivery device they used on a regular basis. Over 80% of the kids who used e-cigarettes reported using products with flavors such as fruit, candy, or dessert-themed nicotine products, which are not as commonly used by adults.

Parents who want to actively prevent their children from the risks of vaping and the lifelong effects of nicotine addiction must first arm themselves with knowledge about vaping and nicotine. We lay the groundwork for your success by using a physician’s expertise to make sense of the latest reports from the CDC and the current research around the world. This guide summarizes that information in easy-to-digest question and answer segments. Our goal is to give you the tools you need to engage your teenagers (and anyone else) in healthy discussion on the risks and consequences of vaping.


[i] US FDA. Results from the Annual National Youth Tobacco Survey (2022). https://www.fda.gov/tobacco-products/youth-and-tobacco/results-annual-national-youth-tobacco-survey