250% between February 2020 and September 2021, rising from 2.8 million units to 9.6 million units, according to recent sales tracking reported by the CDC Foundation.
Four out of five disposable e-cigarettes sold come in flavors other than tobacco, mint and menthol, the CDC Foundation noted.
Total e-cigarette sales increased by more than 60% during the same period of time (from about 15 million to 24 million units), the CDC Foundation reports. That includes sales of non-tobacco flavored e-cigarettes rising by 86%.
About 1 in every 5 high school seniors have used an e-cigarette within the last month, according to federal survey data cited by Myers.
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FDA yet to act
“That’s five times as many kids using e-cigarettes as are using cigarettes,” Myers notes.
The FDA says it has acted on more than 98% of the e-cigarette applications it’s received, and has issued denial orders for more than 1 million flavored vaping products, the report noted.
However, the agency has dragged its feet in reviewing applications from the e-cigarette manufacturers with the largest market shares, such as Juul, Vuse Alto, NJOY, blu, Smok and Suorin, the report noted.
Until decisions are made on those applications, the FDA has indicated that the products can still be sold. Attempts to reach the agency for comment were unsuccessful.
“It’s clear that FDA really needs to quickly act and resolve the remaining applications that it has to go,” Erika Sward, assistant vice president of national advocacy for the American Lung Association says. “They’ve claimed to go through millions of applications, but when you leave the products with the highest market share on the market, it’s really only a drop in the bucket.”
Sward and Myers suspect the FDA is being cautious and meticulous in reviewing applications from major manufacturers so that its final decisions will hold up in court.
The agency already faces more than 45 lawsuits from companies whose products have been denied, Myers adds.
“Those applications are perhaps more complete and more substantive than a lot of the products from the smaller companies,” Sward says of the major e-cigarette brands. “I would also assume FDA is trying to get all of its I’s dotted and T’s crossed because while some of the smaller manufacturers are suing FDA over marketing denials, they’re trying to avoid big lawsuits from the big companies.”
The FDA is also grappling with a major loophole that some companies are using to keep selling flavored products.
Puff Bar and other manufacturers have started selling e-cigarettes containing synthetic nicotine. The companies assert that this “tobacco-free nicotine” doesn’t fall under the jurisdiction of the FDA’s Center for Tobacco Control.
The FDA issued a warning letter against Puff Bar in July 2020, ordering the company to remove its flavored disposable e-cigarettes from the market because they didn’t have the required authorization.
In response, Puff Bar re-launched this February with a new synthetic nicotine formula that they claim