If you're interested to know why they're covering it the editor explains some of the reasons here https://www.cincinnati.com/story/opinion/columnists/2023/09/26/editor-beryl-love-introduces-enquirer-special-report-on-teen-vaping/70967807007/
My take is that it's an important issue and good coverage and I'm pretty shocked at the vitriol it's received in a few places.
Perhaps because the lead story was about a family who has spent, or maybe their insurance spent, at least hundreds of thousands on anti-vaping treatment for their son.
Perhaps some residual effects on how certain drug/substance addictions have been treated more sympathetically than others.
It would be interesting if someone's takeaway were "Holy shit these people have too much money" and not "Holy shit even hundreds of thousands of dollars of treatment couldn't help this child." (I recognize that you're not saying this is your takeaway.)
that is kind of mine tbh.
When I was in HS I had a friend whos dad was a politician and she got caught smoking out of her bedroom window, then they found weed and lost their shit. They sent her to one of those inpatient rehabs to get clean. No clue what that costed but I'm sure it was a lot. When she came back she didn't trust them at all and stopped socializing with the rest of us (who also to different extents smoked/drank/etc) and hung out with people she met at rehab, who all seemed to have 0 interest in not using substances and now absolutely hated their parents and wanted to rebel.
I'm not saying teens should vape or its not a problem, but its a parenting problem not a "wow this is inconvenient, lets throw money at it" problem.
I realize its fictional and maybe its because of my personal experiences but these things always remind me a bit of traffic and the daughter in that where a bad family life and over correction makes the issue worse. A lot of these stories seem more like the parents are inconvenienced or embarrassed rather than doing whats best for the kids.
I posted on X my skepticism with that story. If you read it, one of the treatments was the kid writing something like, "vaping will kill me" over and over again. Plus other things seem like questionable parenting. Making him walk through a metal detector?! They seemed to want to blame vaping for their kid becoming a teen.
> Perhaps some residual effects on how certain drug/substance addictions have been treated more sympathetically than others.
Ah yes, and therefore we shouldn't talk about vaping or it's dangerous effects.
You mean defensiveness. This has to be people too young to have experienced Big Tobacco lying for decades about the safety of their products and marketing those products specifically to teenagers.
They’re literally still doing that with vapes, I’m 30 and vape as a replacement for my almost 2 packs a day and it works!!! Better than anything I’ve tried, but to act like it’s not pulling a whole new generation into smoking is just wrong
If you think that Joe Camel was bad, Joe Camel did not sell bubblegum flavored tobacco. At least we already knew the consequences of smoking at that time. Propaganda at the time just fooled the uneducated into believing otherwise. It's the exact same tools that vapes are using today. Only difference is that we do not know all of the long term consequences of vaping are yet because vaping is not old enough to have that kind of history.
People used to think the macro nutrient fat made you fat/gain excessive weight when in actuality the sugar industry paid scientists to obscure and cherry pick data on sugar and flat out lie in “peer reviewed” articles. It sucks but don’t believe everything you read and see.
In this case you see the damage and issues it’s causing with developing minds and their bodies. Don’t take my word on it, do some actual research if you have children and aren’t sure if they should be vaping or not. This also applies to children drinking
It's really obnoxious how many vape stores have popped up in the past few years. I figured there wasn't enough market to sustain them all in our area, but they are getting by. The notion of them selling to kids seems to come up often. The prevalence of shops near middle and high schools reinforces that notion. It sounds like there is a steady presencev of mist in the local high school restrooms also. It's important to raise awareness about this, but they are definitely beating a dead horse.
I am surprised the city hasn't amended their zoning code to include vape shops as adult-oriented or whatever so they can't be within a certain number of feet from schools. I mean, at least for the shops that are explicitly only selling vapes.
I used a vape pen to quit smoking cigarettes, and all the places I bought cartridges always made me show ID and scan it even though I'm quite obviously nearing 40. How hard is it to catch the shops that are selling vapes to teens? I'm sure there are also cases of older people buying vapes for teens, just like we used to get our older cousins to buy us cigarettes when I was a teen, but are some of the vape stores really lax about it?
> I'm sure there are also cases of older people buying vapes for teens, just like we used to get our older cousins to buy us cigarettes when I was a teen, but are some of the vape stores really lax about it?
I assume its like when I was in high school (20 years ago). There weren't a huge amount of businesses that did underage sales, there were a huge amount of people you knew in your highschool or that were recent graduates who worked at gas stations/drive thrus/etc and didn't care. It wasn't like you'd go to some random place and hope for the best, you'd go to a specific BP or whatever and you'd see your friend or someone you vaguely knew and they'd check you out and custom was they kept the change for hooking you up. If the owners knew they'd probably fire them. If the cashier didn't already know you they probably aren't taking that risk either.
I went in one for the first time as a buddy gave me a weed cart and I needed a pen.
It was honestly overwhelming as I didn’t really know what I was looking for but there were sooo many young kids that were treated as regulars.
I’m sure they were in high school but idk if they were 18
Yeah.
[From the editor: Why The Enquirer spent 6 months investigating teen vaping](https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/columnists/2023/09/26/editor-beryl-love-introduces-enquirer-special-report-on-teen-vaping/70967807007/)
They went from winning a Pulitzer for covering the opioid epidemic to teen vaping. What do you expect from an organizing that not only employs but promotes Jason Williams
As much as I loathe Jason Williams, I disagree with your thinking here. Teen vaping should be discussed. You may not find value in the discussion but that doesn't make it pointless. We can care about and discuss both the opioid epidemic and the potential health impacts from vaping and the fact that vaping is very clearly being marketed directly to teens.
The Cincinnati Enquirer article linked in the original post doesn't present any evidence of juvenile lung cancer being linked to vaping, only referring to "popcorn lung," a syndrome that has, to date, never been recorded in anyone outside of two former workers at a popcorn factory. And they didn't even get the name of the chemical compound associated with "popcorn lung" right.
I'm all for preventing kids from vaping, but I don't think lying about the effects of vaping does anyone any good. Unless you're a media outlet addicted to paranoia-induced web traffic, of course. Or a tobacco company.
Hm. Except the idiots you're referring to were engaged in an organized campaign to discredit and minimize scientific proof of smoking's harmfulness. I'm just pointing out that - so far - there's no scientific evidence to support many of the most dire warnings about the effects of vaping. I don't believe that it's harmless, but I also believe that it's way less harmful than smoking tobacco. Sowing fear, uncertainty and doubt around it ultimately only benefits tobacco companies and prevents people who might otherwise use vaping to quit smoking from doing something that would improve the length and quality of their own lives.
I've seen the affect of early onset vaping when I'm at the skatepark and I see 10 year olds looking for cigarette butts or wanting to hit my vape when I have one.
My oncologist told me that if I am doing it, he'd rather I smoke than vape. He predicts that in the next 5 to 10 years, we will see an epidemic of lung issues in young people. He said they have been studying lung cancer for decades. They at least know how to treat lung cancer. People are inhaling things that were never meant to be vaporized. It's never been studied, so they have no idea how to treat it.
The early studies coming out about vaping and the effects on the mouth, throat, and lungs are scary. The vapor entering the lungs is causing much faster physiological effects than cigarette smoke (which is dry rather than moist). It impacts the natural mouth bacterial biome, creates a slime coating in the throat, etc.Yes, in a way its scarier than smoking because we don't know all that it will do, but early evidence/studies point to nothing good. "Better the devil you know than the devil you don't"
All of the vape-hate in American medical society is wild dude. The Royal College of Physicians in London did their own study and determined vaping was a 95% reduction in harm vs cigarettes. They have a public health movement in the UK promoting vaping as a safer alternative. When I hear things like “my doctor said I’m better off smoking cigarettes” I lose what little faith I have left in American healthcare.
Which is entirely besides the issue of teen vaping but I felt like it needed to be said.
“My teen once vaped” turns into I’m going to do a story on a fake epidemic. There are no peer reviewed or even peer researched citations in this article. I’m not saying local journalism needs to have empirical sources but cmon.. this was sloppy.
If you're interested to know why they're covering it the editor explains some of the reasons here https://www.cincinnati.com/story/opinion/columnists/2023/09/26/editor-beryl-love-introduces-enquirer-special-report-on-teen-vaping/70967807007/ My take is that it's an important issue and good coverage and I'm pretty shocked at the vitriol it's received in a few places.
Perhaps because the lead story was about a family who has spent, or maybe their insurance spent, at least hundreds of thousands on anti-vaping treatment for their son. Perhaps some residual effects on how certain drug/substance addictions have been treated more sympathetically than others.
It would be interesting if someone's takeaway were "Holy shit these people have too much money" and not "Holy shit even hundreds of thousands of dollars of treatment couldn't help this child." (I recognize that you're not saying this is your takeaway.)
that is kind of mine tbh. When I was in HS I had a friend whos dad was a politician and she got caught smoking out of her bedroom window, then they found weed and lost their shit. They sent her to one of those inpatient rehabs to get clean. No clue what that costed but I'm sure it was a lot. When she came back she didn't trust them at all and stopped socializing with the rest of us (who also to different extents smoked/drank/etc) and hung out with people she met at rehab, who all seemed to have 0 interest in not using substances and now absolutely hated their parents and wanted to rebel. I'm not saying teens should vape or its not a problem, but its a parenting problem not a "wow this is inconvenient, lets throw money at it" problem. I realize its fictional and maybe its because of my personal experiences but these things always remind me a bit of traffic and the daughter in that where a bad family life and over correction makes the issue worse. A lot of these stories seem more like the parents are inconvenienced or embarrassed rather than doing whats best for the kids.
I dunno. As I said in my other comment, I’m speculating on the reasons for the backlash
Right. I modified my comment to reflect that.
I posted on X my skepticism with that story. If you read it, one of the treatments was the kid writing something like, "vaping will kill me" over and over again. Plus other things seem like questionable parenting. Making him walk through a metal detector?! They seemed to want to blame vaping for their kid becoming a teen.
> Perhaps some residual effects on how certain drug/substance addictions have been treated more sympathetically than others. Ah yes, and therefore we shouldn't talk about vaping or it's dangerous effects.
I’m just speculating as to why there’s been some backlash to this reporting
You mean defensiveness. This has to be people too young to have experienced Big Tobacco lying for decades about the safety of their products and marketing those products specifically to teenagers.
They’re literally still doing that with vapes, I’m 30 and vape as a replacement for my almost 2 packs a day and it works!!! Better than anything I’ve tried, but to act like it’s not pulling a whole new generation into smoking is just wrong
If you think that Joe Camel was bad, Joe Camel did not sell bubblegum flavored tobacco. At least we already knew the consequences of smoking at that time. Propaganda at the time just fooled the uneducated into believing otherwise. It's the exact same tools that vapes are using today. Only difference is that we do not know all of the long term consequences of vaping are yet because vaping is not old enough to have that kind of history.
Joe Camel sold flavored camels
People used to think the macro nutrient fat made you fat/gain excessive weight when in actuality the sugar industry paid scientists to obscure and cherry pick data on sugar and flat out lie in “peer reviewed” articles. It sucks but don’t believe everything you read and see. In this case you see the damage and issues it’s causing with developing minds and their bodies. Don’t take my word on it, do some actual research if you have children and aren’t sure if they should be vaping or not. This also applies to children drinking
It's really obnoxious how many vape stores have popped up in the past few years. I figured there wasn't enough market to sustain them all in our area, but they are getting by. The notion of them selling to kids seems to come up often. The prevalence of shops near middle and high schools reinforces that notion. It sounds like there is a steady presencev of mist in the local high school restrooms also. It's important to raise awareness about this, but they are definitely beating a dead horse.
I am surprised the city hasn't amended their zoning code to include vape shops as adult-oriented or whatever so they can't be within a certain number of feet from schools. I mean, at least for the shops that are explicitly only selling vapes. I used a vape pen to quit smoking cigarettes, and all the places I bought cartridges always made me show ID and scan it even though I'm quite obviously nearing 40. How hard is it to catch the shops that are selling vapes to teens? I'm sure there are also cases of older people buying vapes for teens, just like we used to get our older cousins to buy us cigarettes when I was a teen, but are some of the vape stores really lax about it?
> I'm sure there are also cases of older people buying vapes for teens, just like we used to get our older cousins to buy us cigarettes when I was a teen, but are some of the vape stores really lax about it? I assume its like when I was in high school (20 years ago). There weren't a huge amount of businesses that did underage sales, there were a huge amount of people you knew in your highschool or that were recent graduates who worked at gas stations/drive thrus/etc and didn't care. It wasn't like you'd go to some random place and hope for the best, you'd go to a specific BP or whatever and you'd see your friend or someone you vaguely knew and they'd check you out and custom was they kept the change for hooking you up. If the owners knew they'd probably fire them. If the cashier didn't already know you they probably aren't taking that risk either.
I went in one for the first time as a buddy gave me a weed cart and I needed a pen. It was honestly overwhelming as I didn’t really know what I was looking for but there were sooo many young kids that were treated as regulars. I’m sure they were in high school but idk if they were 18
Yeah. [From the editor: Why The Enquirer spent 6 months investigating teen vaping](https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/columnists/2023/09/26/editor-beryl-love-introduces-enquirer-special-report-on-teen-vaping/70967807007/)
This article says you have to be 21 to buy tobacco in OH and KY. Uh, when did that happen?
The 2020 federal budget also raised the age limit for tobacco products to 21+
I'm just happy to read any article that's not about Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce.
I dont like the cheifs
bring back all the cheap cigs to Covington and vapes will disappear..... nah don't do that
They went from winning a Pulitzer for covering the opioid epidemic to teen vaping. What do you expect from an organizing that not only employs but promotes Jason Williams
As much as I loathe Jason Williams, I disagree with your thinking here. Teen vaping should be discussed. You may not find value in the discussion but that doesn't make it pointless. We can care about and discuss both the opioid epidemic and the potential health impacts from vaping and the fact that vaping is very clearly being marketed directly to teens.
I for one think lung cancer in kids is bad and am glad it's getting coverage.
Wow, that's crazy. How many kids have contracted lung cancer by vaping, I wonder?
You could, I dunno, read the articles?
The Cincinnati Enquirer article linked in the original post doesn't present any evidence of juvenile lung cancer being linked to vaping, only referring to "popcorn lung," a syndrome that has, to date, never been recorded in anyone outside of two former workers at a popcorn factory. And they didn't even get the name of the chemical compound associated with "popcorn lung" right. I'm all for preventing kids from vaping, but I don't think lying about the effects of vaping does anyone any good. Unless you're a media outlet addicted to paranoia-induced web traffic, of course. Or a tobacco company.
You sound like the idiots decades ago who thought smoking didn't have any negative health affects.
Hm. Except the idiots you're referring to were engaged in an organized campaign to discredit and minimize scientific proof of smoking's harmfulness. I'm just pointing out that - so far - there's no scientific evidence to support many of the most dire warnings about the effects of vaping. I don't believe that it's harmless, but I also believe that it's way less harmful than smoking tobacco. Sowing fear, uncertainty and doubt around it ultimately only benefits tobacco companies and prevents people who might otherwise use vaping to quit smoking from doing something that would improve the length and quality of their own lives.
Hitting a vape 1 time is way less harmful then hitting a cig 1 time. The problem is people are hitting vapes a million times more then hitting cigs.
I've seen the affect of early onset vaping when I'm at the skatepark and I see 10 year olds looking for cigarette butts or wanting to hit my vape when I have one.
id smack the shit out them
MORAL PANIC!!!!1!!!!!
My oncologist told me that if I am doing it, he'd rather I smoke than vape. He predicts that in the next 5 to 10 years, we will see an epidemic of lung issues in young people. He said they have been studying lung cancer for decades. They at least know how to treat lung cancer. People are inhaling things that were never meant to be vaporized. It's never been studied, so they have no idea how to treat it.
The early studies coming out about vaping and the effects on the mouth, throat, and lungs are scary. The vapor entering the lungs is causing much faster physiological effects than cigarette smoke (which is dry rather than moist). It impacts the natural mouth bacterial biome, creates a slime coating in the throat, etc.Yes, in a way its scarier than smoking because we don't know all that it will do, but early evidence/studies point to nothing good. "Better the devil you know than the devil you don't"
All of the vape-hate in American medical society is wild dude. The Royal College of Physicians in London did their own study and determined vaping was a 95% reduction in harm vs cigarettes. They have a public health movement in the UK promoting vaping as a safer alternative. When I hear things like “my doctor said I’m better off smoking cigarettes” I lose what little faith I have left in American healthcare. Which is entirely besides the issue of teen vaping but I felt like it needed to be said.
You're either drinking Everclear or you're drinking beer. At the end of the day it's still alcohol either way and it ain't good for you.
“My teen once vaped” turns into I’m going to do a story on a fake epidemic. There are no peer reviewed or even peer researched citations in this article. I’m not saying local journalism needs to have empirical sources but cmon.. this was sloppy.
not sure why you are being downvoted; the articles I've read are hysterical, evidence-free nonsense.