A study on why youths consume electronic cigarettes has determined that the driving factor is avoiding or reducing harm from smoking traditional cigarettes, rather than the attraction of candy and fruit flavorings. The study was based on a survey of 418 individuals between ages 12 and 17 by the National Institutes of Health and the Food and Drug Administration between September 2013 and December 2014. The individuals had used a vapor product during a 30-day period.

The data was analyzed by PinneyAssociates, a pharmaceutical development company that formed a partnership with Reynolds American Inc. in 2015. Nearly 90 percent of the respondents said that “they might be less harmful to me than cigarettes” or “they might be less harmful to people around me than cigarettes.” The results were released recently at the annual meeting of the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco.“These data show that even teens who are using e-cigarettes are motivated by harm reduction,” said Saul Shiffman, a senior scientific adviser to PinneyAssociates and professor of psychology at the University of Pittsburgh.

Some studies, including one by the Royal College of Physicians, have claimed e-cigs and vaporizers are up to 95 percent less harmful than traditional cigarettes. The Royal College’s study on traditional cigarettes played a key role in the landmark 1964 surgeon general’s determination on the harmful effects of smoking.

“Use of any tobacco or nicotine product by teens should be strongly discouraged, but it’s important that our thinking balances concerns about this use with the potential benefits of vaping for smokers who want to reduce their harm,” Shiffman said.The PinneyAssociates-Reynolds partnership aims to expand the manufacturer’s product portfolio for consumers who want to eliminate or reduce nicotine consumption. PinneyAssociates has been working with Niconovum USA Inc. and R.J. Reynolds Vapor Co. on products, regulations and policies related to smoking cessation and harm minimization. Neither company has disclosed developments.

Reynolds spokesman David Howard said the PinneyAssociates analysis “is not related to our partnership, and we had no input at all.” The PinneyAssociates analysis represents the latest study of major motivations for youths to consume e-cigs and vaporizers. Some anti-tobacco advocates and federal agencies express concerns about e-cigs and vaporizers being a gateway to traditional cigarettes, particularly since they are sold in flavorings not available with traditional cigarettes, such as candy, coffee and fruit. T

hose advocates tend to tout a “quit or die” philosophy on tobacco products and are urging the FDA to ban all vapor flavorings. Other anti-tobacco advocates, who believe e-cigs can play a reduced-risk benefit to public health, said the jump in e-cig usage is a positive development considering that traditional cigarette usage “reached historical lows among teens in 2014.” PinneyAssociates said its analysis rebuts a research letter in the Journal of the American Medical Association that reviewed the same study data. The JAMA letter claimed flavorings were the top reason why youths smoke e-cigs and vaporizers.

Shiffman said that “by not combining responses citing harm reduction, the earlier (JAMA) analysis overemphasized the comparative role of flavors in youth vaping decisions.”“Among the teens who said flavors were important, fully 92 percent also said harm reduction was their motive for vaping.“Flavors play a role in youth experimentation with e-cigarettes, but this analysis underscores that the much lower harm of vaping compared to smoking cigarettes is a far more important factor,” Shiffman said. Gregory Conley, president of the American Vaping Association, said the study “adds to the extensive body of evidence showing that harm reduction is the key reason why people vape.”

“Unfortunately, as demonstrated by the JAMA letter, there is no shortage of activist researchers who are willing to ignore evidence if it suits their predetermined conclusions.” John Spangler, a professor of family and community medicine at Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center, said, “I find these results pretty exciting” as he acknowledged the “underlying disagreement” between the JAMA and PinneyAssociates analyses. Spangler has expressed concern about the increasing in youth vaping rates in North Carolina since the products went mainstream at retail early in this decade.

“It was unclear what was driving these divergent trajectories,” Spangler said. “In an ideal world, no one would start vaping or using tobacco.“However, this article is reassuring in that it appears that adolescents and young adults seek nicotine by vaping to avoid harm associated with tobacco use.“This study tempers my concern about vaping flavors,” Spangler said. “We used to believe that flavoring was the main reason enticing youth to vape. That belief now appears to be less certain.

tags:ecigs, e cigarette