In a study led by Mayra Vargas-Rivera, clinical research laboratory manager, and Wasim Maziak, director and professor, at the Clinical Research Lab for Tobacco Smoking in the Department of Epidemiology at the Robert Stempel College of Public Health & Social Work, investigators completed one of the first controlled studies to examine the effects of restricting flavor of JUUL on users’ experience.
“This pilot study was part of an intramural FIU RCMI Initiative that allowed us to study and compare the effect of switching from preferred sweet, fruity e-cigarette flavors to the standard tobacco flavor on the user’s experience, puffing behavior, and product appeal during actual, live e-cigarette use sessions conducted at our state-of-the-art Tobacco Smoking Lab,” Vargas-Rivera explained. The results were recently published in the premier specialty journal Tobacco Control .
While the legal age to purchase e-cigarettes in the United States was raised from 18 to 21 in December 2019, youth e-cigarette smoking, or vaping, continues to be a challenging national health crisis with alarming estimates that one in three high school students regularly use the tobacco products, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Similar to high-schoolers, the use of e-cigarettes among young adults has been steadily increasing, with recent results from the Monitoring the Future national study reporting that the past-30 day vaping among college students more than doubled from 6.1 percent in 2017, to 15.5 percent in 2018. Young e-cigarette users cite flavors as a top reason they began using e-cigarettes.
“Though the FDA had originally announced that they were considering a ban on all e-cigarette flavors except tobacco, the final policy enacted earlier this year is actually a ‘partial ban’ prohibiting all flavors except menthol and tobacco from pod-based e-cigarette products, such as the extremely popular brand Juul. However, all flavors are still permissible on disposable vapes and those with an open-tank system,” Vargas-Rivera said.
Concerns are that the popularity of vaping among teens and young adults are likely to continue as youths are enticed by the sweet flavors available from e-cigarettes and get addicted to nicotine, which is not only detrimental to the brain development of adolescents but leads to life-long addiction. In addition, the smoke produced by e-cigarettes also exposes the user to other toxic e-liquid components or by-products, such as formaldehyde and diacetyl.
The study found that, compared to the user’s preferred flavor, participants using the standard tobacco flavored JUUL pod reported less satisfaction, enjoyment, urge to vape, and product appeal. In fact, participants said that they would be less likely to vape the tobacco flavored JUUL in the future, even if it was the only available flavor.
While other studies have documented the importance of flavor in attracting youth to use e-cigarettes and sustaining use, this study was the first to investigate empirically the effects of limiting of the popular e-cigarettes (JUUL) flavor on users puffing, exposure to toxicants and user satisfaction.
“This pilot study reveals that e-cigarette flavor plays a significant role in product appeal, satisfaction, and the likelihood to vape,” Vargas-Rivera said. “Considering that flavors are still fully available in disposable and open-tank systems, and that e-cigarette usage among this age demographic is still increasing, we believe that limiting flavors on all devices represents a potentially effective strategy that needs to be further explored to reduce the appeal and use of e-cigarettes by young people in the US.”