Teen whose lung collapsed after vaping wants to share experience
After his vaping addiction led to a collapsed lung, a Miami Beach Senior High School graduate quit using his e-cigarette and focused his attention on helping other young people kick the habit.
Now he’s hoping his hometown leaders will collaborate with him to develop a holistic nicotine-prevention program in public schools in Miami Beach.
Chance Ammirata, an 18-yearold anti-vaping activist, addressed the City Commission on recently asking to help implement a pilot program in Miami Beach public schools to teach students as young as fifth-graders about the dangers of vape nicotine use.
Two people have died in Florida due to complications from vaping, according to the Department of Health. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has reported 48 deaths in 25 states and the District of Columbia as of Dec. 3. E-cigarette aerosol may contain ultra-fine particles that users inhale into the lungs, flavoring chemicals and cancer-causing chemicals, the CDC says.
Ammirata, who founded a nonprofit called Lung Love Foundation, speaks at schools across the country delivering his message. He said he would be an ideal spokesman for that message in Miami Beach schools because he got caught up in the epidemic and could easily relate to students just a few years younger than he is.
He began using Juul e-cigarettes his junior year of high school after a friend “casually” introduced him to vaping. Before long, he couldn’t walk through the hallway without craving a hit. He said he saw the e-cigarette epidemic bloom while in high school.
During his freshman year, no one was vaping. But by junior year, seeing students pile into bathrooms to get a nicotine buzz became normal.
“It was insane, it was so quick,” he said. “Every time you’d walk into the bathroom, everyone was Juuling. It was just normal for people to relate about their Juul problems. It became so casual that it was just like talking about anything. It was only because I was addicted that it seemed so casual.”
He, like countless other teens, had been taught not to smoke cigarettes. But he thought vaping was safe. It’s just water vapor, a friend told him. Almost two years later — about four months ago — he was in the hospital with a collapsed lung.
The doctor showed him pictures of his lungs, with black dots scattered “all over them,” he said.
“My doctor compared them to the lungs of a 50-year-old man,” he said.
By the time he was out of surgery, the doctor told Ammirata he “could never smoke again.” That was almost worse news to him.
“I felt so addicted to it that I said, ‘What? I can’t smoke again?’ ” he said. “That was my first thought, which is insane.”
While Miami Dade Public Schools implemented efforts in 2018 to educate students and parents about the dangers of vaping, Ammirata said the program shouldn’t target only high-schoolers. The real problem starts in middle school, he said, before the majority of teens start vaping.