Lucas McClain started smoking cigarettes in high school but switched to vaping after he heard e-cigarettes were a safer alternative. ...
Now 21, McClain wants to quit so badly that he’s turning back to the problem he fled in the first place: good old-fashioned cigarettes.
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Even though McClain knows the dangers of cigarettes — lung cancer runs in his family — he thinks it might be easier to kick cigarettes than his Juul. Plus, his mom keeps warning him about the mysterious vaping-related illnesses that have sickened hundreds across the country.
So last month, McClain bought his first pack of cigarettes in years. Then he tweeted about it.
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Some are turning back to combustible cigarettes — or taking them up for the first time — in a dangerous bid to lower their nicotine intake and ultimately get off their vapes.
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It isn’t a complete surprise that some young people are “going back to the product they were trying to quit in the first place,” said Pamela Ling, a professor of medicine at UC San Francisco who studies tobacco and its marketing.
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Last week, the Food and Drug Administration reprimanded Juul for promoting its products as being safer than cigarettes without FDA permission. It gave Juul 15 business days to respond.
Vaping has become big business, with the global market projected to hit $48 billion by 2023.
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Michigan last week became the first state to ban sales of flavored e-cigarettes in an attempt to end teen vaping. In June, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors banned the sale of all e-cigarettes, beginning in early 2020. Juul is fighting back with a November ballot measure, Proposition C, backed by millions of its own dollars.
Many former smokers attest that vaping was the only thing that helped them quit cigarettes, but the science is mixed. Some studies have shown that many vapers continue to smoke cigarettes.
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Dr. Amanda Graham, senior vice president of innovations at the Truth Initiative, an anti-tobacco advocacy group, said she was seeing “desperation and misguided approaches” from teens and young adults trying to free themselves from nicotine.
“Young people are fumbling in the dark with what seems logical,” Graham said. “But there is no safe level of cigarette smoking.”
Early this year, Graham’s group launched a digital program to help teens and young adults quit their vaping devices. Since then, 41,000 people ages 13 to 24 have enrolled in “This is Quitting,” which sends them tips and support via text messages.
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“I think a lot of people are quitting completely or going back to cigarettes,” he said. “They’re waking up to the reality that maybe this isn’t as safe as we once thought.”
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