Two New Studies Discredit the CDC's Dire Warnings About E-Cigarettes and Teenagers
Very few nonsmoking teenagers vape regularly, and even fewer vape nicotine.
For several years now, the CDC has been freaking out about adolescent e-cigarette use, which it warns will boost smoking by getting teenagers hooked on nicotine in a more palatable form. But as I explain in my latest Forbes column, that does not seem to be happening, and new research suggests it probably never will:
Three years ago, Thomas Frieden, director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC),warned that "many kids are starting out with e-cigarettes and then going on to smoke conventional cigarettes." That fear is one of the main justifications for the CDC's hostility toward vaping and the Food and Drug Administration's onerous new e-cigarette regulations, which are expected to cripple the industry. Yet there is no evidence that Frieden's claim is true and considerable evidence that it's not, especially since smoking rates among teenagers have fallen to record lows even as more and more of them experiment with vaping. Two new studies cast further doubt on the idea that e-cigarettes are a "gateway" to the real thing.
