A hundred times better than teenagers smoking.
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I used to think that, too. Then I read this post[1]. JUUL has more nicotine than a cigarette and there’s less friction to using it: a 10 second hit instead of a 10 minute cigarette and there’s no need to find a lighter or go outside. It also doesn’t really smell so it’s easy to use discretely.
All of that adds up to people who think JUUL is safer or can help them quit but it actually gets them hooked even more.
It’s like trying to cure a coffee addiction by switching to a shot of espresso. It might look like cutting back but it’s really doubling up.
[1]https://gen.medium.com/confessions-of-a-juul-junkie-6b5ce4a8...
What you're missing is that nicotine is harmless on its own; in fact, it's commonly used as a "nootropic" (cognitive enhancer) [0].
The true danger of smoking cigarettes is not the nicotine - that's simply the vessel by one gets addicted. The true danger is the tar and other carcinogenic by-products of inhaling a combusted tobacco plant.
Anecdotally, I started smoking cigarettes as a university undergraduate. I used Juuls (and other e-cigarettes, both disposable and refillable) to help me quit, and I'm now nicotine and tobacco free.
When I smoked cigarettes, I would wake up every morning hacking my lungs out. I smelled awful. I couldn't engage in cardiovascular exercise for longer than a minute.
With e-cigarettes, my coughing went away and my lung capacity returned to approximately normal. In fact, I competed in two Spartan Beast races while addicted to e-cigs.
Juul is an awful company for marketing towards children, but it's no exaggeration to say that e-cigarettes saved my life.
Nicotine is not harmless! Look at all the adverse effects (they all have citations): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicotine
Neither is caffeine, but no one is up an arms about teens blowing their part time wages on $6 lattes and ruining their teeth. Maybe because SBUX is publicly traded?
> What you're missing is that nicotine is harmless on its own
So if middle schoolers everywhere suddenly started chewing nicorette gum you would think it’s totally harmless? I suspect not.
I must say that I’m a little bothered that that’s all you appear to have gotten out of my comment.
Probably a similar level of harm as drinking energy drinks.
Nicotine doesn't cause chronic disease, though. It's the tar and other toxins that cause the majority of negative effects from smoking.
> JUUL has more nicotine than a cigarette and there’s less friction to using it: a 10 second hit instead of a 10 minute cigarette and there’s no need to find a lighter or go outside.
They chose the nicotine concentration to mimic the delivery of a regular cigarette. Not less or more, but the same.
A pod will deliver the same amount of nicotine to a user as 20 cigarettes.
A 10-second hit is nowhere near the same as smoking an entire cigarette. It has the same feeling as an equivalent drag on a smoke.
And a thousand time worse than teenagers not smoking...
IIRC, before Juul teenage smoking was trending down. Now it's going up.
Any sources? That'd be helpful for my verdict!
https://www.fda.gov/tobacco-products/youth-and-tobacco/youth...
Buried but smoking cigarettes was trending down for years then e-cigs, mostly Juul, caused it to skyrocket
In this same article, the tobacco-powered sources of nicotine use are down this in 2019 to 5.8 for high school students. It's up to 2.3 for middle school users, though.
e-cig (nicotine and some liquids to make it a vape) is up quite a lot; but, it looks like children are not converting from e-cig use to tobacco use, which was a fear that I had when I was earlier considering e-cigs.
My fear was basically that if enough people start using e-cigs and want to "graduate" to tobacco use, then over all tobacco use will increase. That does not seem to be happening in high school students.
It's definitely not good that a quarter of highschoolers are indulging in a highly addictive substance; but, I think there are other means of managing that than making the product illegal or tasteless.
Only if you count vaping as equal to "smoking cigarettes". The link you shared shows that smoking among that cohort in 2019 was the lowest it has ever been.
You're conflating tobacco use with smoking. The information in the link basically contradicts what you're saying.
But vaping is not smoking.
Sorry, no—just my vague recollection. Looks like someone else found one, though.