John,

Great news: The CDC's 2024 National Youth Tobacco Survey was released yesterday, and it shows that e-cigarette use among U.S. youth declined significantly this year.

This shows that public health measures implemented to reduce youth e-cigarette use are working – including public education campaigns and efforts at the federal, state and local levels to crack down on the sale of flavored e-cigarettes. The Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids has strongly advocated for these measures, and we will continue to do so.

Key numbers:

• E-cigarette use among high school students fell to 7.8%, down from 10% in 2023 and a high of 27.5% in 2019.
  
  
• The number of middle and high school students who reported current e-cigarette use fell to 1.63 million, down from 2.13 million in 2023.

We have to keep fighting.

There's still a long way to go to ensure all kids are protected – but we can get there if we keep a sense of urgency and continue to make the right investments.

A large percentage of youth e-cigarette users, including 42% of high school users and 27% of middle school users, reported frequent or daily use, which is a strong sign of addiction. In addition, 88% of youth users reported using flavored e-cigarettes.

Despite our progress, youth e-cigarette use remains a serious public health problem in the U.S., and the industry remains relentless in finding new ways to addict kids. We cannot let down our guard when over 1.6 million kids still use e-cigarettes and 42% of high school users report frequent or daily use, a strong indication they are addicted to the high-nicotine products now on the market.

Nicotine levels in e-cigarettes have skyrocketed in recent years, and the latest products contain as much nicotine as 20 packs of cigarettes or more, putting kids at risk of rapid and severe addiction. E-cigarette companies have even introduced products with built-in video games.

To fully end this crisis, the FDA and other federal agencies must step up their enforcement efforts to clear the market of all illegal e-cigarettes.

To date, the FDA has authorized the sale of only 34 e-cigarette products, but thousands of illegal, unauthorized products remain on the market. We're working to get the FDA and other agencies to use all the enforcement tools at their disposal to clear the market of these illegal products. At the same time, we're working to get more states and cities to end the sale of flavored e-cigarettes and other flavored tobacco products.

Flavored nicotine pouches are on the rise.

The survey results also include data on youth use of nicotine pouch products like Zyn, which have seen a rapid increase in sales. While youth use of these products remains relatively low, the total number of youth using nicotine pouches has increased from 200,000 in 2021 to 480,000 in 2024. Nicotine pouches have the same characteristics that made e-cigarettes so appealing to young people, including kid-friendly flavors, heavy promotion on social media and being easy to hide.

With your support, we will redouble our work to take on the tobacco industry and prevent youth use of all tobacco products.

Thanks for standing with us,

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