A policy to reduce teen vaping shows promise
More than 2 million high school students report using e-cigarettes, according to a report from the FDA and CDC. Given these numbers, researchers are eager to figure out how to deter children and teens from vaping.
A recent paper from John Tauras, UIC associate professor of economics, and colleagues suggests that raising the cost of e-cigarettes will help reduce teen use. The study, published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, used data from the 2015-2019 Youth Risk Behavior Survey along with e-cigarette sales data from Nielsen to model the effects of price and tax increases on teen vaping.
They found that increasing the cost of e-cigarettes curbed teen vaping behavior, both in terms of frequency and intensity of e-cigarette use.
“This unique methodology shows that youth are sensitive to changes in the price of e-cigarettes and that increasing e-cigarette taxes is likely to have a measurable impact on youth use,” the researchers write.
To learn more, you can read the full journal article here.