The hallways at South Portland (Maine) High School were buzzing recently with talk of the mystery disease that has struck hundreds of young adults who vape. Snapchat, Facebook and Instagram have been filled with grisly photos of severely damaged lungs and stories about vaping-related deaths.

Kara Tierney-Trevor, the school’s social worker, said a handful of students have come to her and admitted that they vape regularly. They say they’re hooked on the sugary-tasting nicotine in their Juuls and they want to quit — but can’t.

“That’s never happened before,” Tierney-Trevor said. “No one ever came to us on their own and asked for help.”

Maine last week banned vaping or possession of an e-cigarette on school grounds, joining Montana, Oklahoma and Virginia. And in the past three years, at least 18 states have raised the legal smoking age for both traditional and e-cigarettes to 21 in response to the meteoric rise in adolescent vaping. 

Other states have tackled flavors in e-cigarettes. Earlier this month, Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan became the first to issue a ban on flavored e-cigarette products to stem adolescent vaping. New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, also a Democrat, issued a similar order. And the Trump administration has asked the Food and Drug Administration to consider a nationwide ban on all flavors of nicotine other than tobacco.

Meanwhile, a bill that would ban sweet-tasting nicotine products is gaining momentum in Massachusetts, and lawmakers in Arkansas, New Jersey and Utah are discussing similar restrictions.

Most people struck with the mystery lung disease had been vaping oils with THC, the psychoactive compound in marijuana, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

But the national scare has given politicians an opening to regulate the nicotine vaping industry, which parents, teachers and some students blame for creating an epidemic of adolescent nicotine vaping.

The new flavoring bans are meant to reduce the allure of nicotine-laced vaping liquids for kids, and federal announcements and media coverage of the health risks to youths who vape aim to discourage them from experimenting with the addictive substance.

But research shows that fear doesn’t work when it comes to preventing adolescents from engaging in risky behavior. In fact, it may attract them. It’s hard to convince adolescents that vaping is dangerous if they see their teachers and parents doing it. And selling vaping products to kids under 18 is already against the law in all 50 states.

South Portland High School has found some strategies that may be working. Like other schools, they’re patrolling bathrooms and hallways and confiscating the devices when they find them.

But instead of suspending students for four to five days as they did under the old policy, school leaders are sending them home for just one day and giving them a thorough behavioral health assessment. School officials also are helping kids find social activities that don’t involve vaping and offering mental health and addiction counseling to kids who are already hooked.

A Sudden Surge

Adolescent cigarette smoking declined for more than four decades, but the most recent annual survey by the National Institute on Drug Abuse found an increase in adolescents using Juuls and other e-cigarettes to inhale nicotine vapors. Almost twice as many high school seniors surveyed were vaping in 2018 as in 2017, increasing from 11% to nearly 21%. 

Vaping has been marketed to adults who already smoke tobacco as a healthier alternative to cigarettes and an effective way to quit.

But the FDA earlier this month ordered Juul Labs, which controls roughly three-quarters of the e-cigarette market, to stop advertising those unproven claims. The safety of e-cigarettes has yet to be scientifically proven, the FDA said.

And vaping nicotine is worse for adolescents, whose brains are still developing and who are more susceptible to addiction.

The nicotine salts used in vaping cartridges affect the brain faster than nicotine in traditional tobacco products.

Because liquid nicotine also metabolizes quickly, kids and adults who become addicted to it need a fix every 20 minutes to avoid feeling ill. For middle- and high-school students, that means raising their hand to go to the bathroom more than twice in a 60- to 90-minute class.

In response to recent lawsuits and federal investigations, Juul Labs has said it will cooperate in efforts to prevent adolescents from vaping. The company denies that it ever marketed to adolescents.

By October of that year, Bennett said school officers were constantly finding kids using the devices in bathrooms and carrying them in the halls.

But after dozens of devices were confiscated and educational programs at the school raised awareness of the problem, the number of students suspended for vaping or possessing a device started dropping.

By 2018, far fewer kids were caught vaping, Bennett said, and this year no devices have been confiscated yet.

But that doesn’t necessarily mean use has gone down, she said. They may just be getting better at hiding it and more careful about when and where they vape, she said.

Still, Bennett, one of three anti-vaping enforcers at South Portland High, says she’s encouraged that some seniors are starting to talk about quitting and they’re angry at the vaping industry for manipulating them into using in the first place.

Mitchell, a South Portland senior who didn’t want his last name published, is one of them. He said he’s been trying to stop for more than a year. He no longer vapes on weekends, he said, but he can’t resist when somebody offers him a hit in the school bathroom.

“Everybody’s just walking around ‘fiending,’” Mitchell said. “They go from bathroom to bathroom looking for a ‘shred’. They’re just like crackheads.”

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