Teachers, parents lament the rise of vaping

SAN FRANCISCO — The 17-year-old Oakland high school senior first tried a Juul after a friend gave him one.

It looked like a computer gadget, but the sleek 4-inch device delivered puffs of sweet-flavored nicotine vapor anytime he wanted. It didn’t set off smoke alarms or smell like cigarettes. It smelled of mango, mint or creme brulee.

Now, less than a year later, he hits a Juul dozens of times a day. He needs it, he says. At school, home, hanging out with friends.

He says he wants to quit. But when he goes without a hit for too long, he gets a headache and body aches. He gets irritable.

“I’ve tried nicotine gum,” said the teen, who attends Bishop O’dowd, a college-prep private school. “I’ve tried patches.”

But he can’t. And, he says, neither can many of his peers.

The graduating senior agreed to speak with The Chronicle about what he described as an addiction to nicotine on the condition he not be identified.

E-cigarettes are marketed as a safer alternative to combustible cigarettes, a tar-free way to wean off nicotine. The vaping industry, worth about $1.1 billion in sales annually and growing, includes a wide range of companies that say the products are not meant for youths or new users.

Yet health officials have been sounding the alarm over the escalating use of e-cigarettes, and especially Juuls, among young people for a few years. The products, they say, come in hundreds of fruit and candy flavors — mango, sweet tart, watermelon, caramel cappuccino — making them attractive to teens. More than 1 of every 4 high school seniors used a vaping device within 2017, according to a University of Michigan survey of 43,000 middle and high school students.

Last month, the Food and Drug Administration announced a plan to crack down on the sale of Juuls to youths and requested the San Francisco maker of the product, Juuls Labs, turn over documents related to the device’s design, marketing and ingredients.

In an emailed statement, Juuls Lab officials said the company supports efforts to reduce

NICK COTE / THE NEW YORK TIMES During a presentation at Nevin Platt Middle School in Boulder, Colo., Liz Blackwell, a school nurse, shows a collection of vape pens that have been confiscated from students.