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Letter
Prevalence of using pod-based vaping devices by brand among youth and young adults
  1. Andy S L Tan1,2,
  2. Samir S Soneji3,
  3. Kelvin Choi4,
  4. Meghan B Moran5
  1. 1 Department of Medical Oncology, Division of Population Sciences, Center for Community-Based Research, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, Massachusetts, USA
  2. 2 Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, Massachusetts, USA
  3. 3 The Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy & Clinical Practice, Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth University, Lebanon, New Hampshire, USA
  4. 4 Division of Intramural Research, National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities, Bethesda, Maryland, USA
  5. 5 Department of Health, Behavior & Society, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, Maryland, USA
  1. Correspondence to Dr Andy S L Tan, Department of Medical Oncology, Division of Population Sciences, Center for Community-Based Research, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, Massachusetts 02215, USA; andy_tan{at}dfci.harvard.edu

https://doi.org/10.1136/tobaccocontrol-2019-055064

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    Background

    An estimated 10%–44% of youth and young adults have ever used JUUL, the leading e-cigarette brand in the USA,1 while 8%–9% reported past 30-day use of JUUL.2–5 Although there is growing attention on the prevalence of JUUL use, prevalence of using other brands of pod-based vaping devices is unknown. This information is important to assess whether newer brands are gaining popularity among young people and to complement sales data which do not track online purchases and sales through non-participating retailers or provide information about characteristics of users.1 This study assesses the prevalence of current use of JUUL, Suorin and Vuse across demographic and tobacco use characteristics among US youth and young adults.

    Methods

    Study population and procedure

    Data came from 2000 US youth and young adults recruited through the SSRS national online opt-in survey panel6: 15–17 years old (500 ever smokers, 500 never smokers) or 18–24 years old (500 who smoked within the past 30 days and had smoked >100 lifetime cigarettes, 500 who did not smoke in the past 30 days or had smoked <100 lifetime cigarettes). Participants completed an online survey from December 2018 to January 2019.

    Measures

    Participants were asked if they have ever used JUUL, Suorin and Vuse. The question for Vuse referred to using the brand of e-cigarettes in general and was not limited to the pod-based sub-brand (ie, Vuse Alto). Response …

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    Footnotes

    • Contributors MM designed and implemented the study. MM, ASLT, SS and KC generated the survey questions used for the study collectively. MM, SS and ASLT performed the analysis. ASLT and SS wrote the manuscript. All authors contributed to revising the manuscript.

    • Funding Data collection for this study was supported by the National Institute on Drug Abuse and Food and Drug Administration Center for Tobacco Products (K01DA037903-S1). MM’s effort were supported by the National Institute on Drug Abuse and Food and Drug Administration Center for Tobacco Products (K01DA037903). KC’s effort is supported by the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities Division of Intramural Research. Funding sources did not have any role in the study design; collection, analysis and interpretation of data; writing the report; the decision to submit the report for publication. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the US Government, the Department of Health and Human Services, the Food and Drug Administration, or the National Institutes of Health.

    • Competing interests MM is serving as an expert witness for the prosecutor (Public Health Advocacy Institute) in litigation in which RJ Reynolds Tobacco Company was the defendant.

    • Patient consent for publication Not required.

    • Ethics approval and informed consent The Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health’s Institutional Review Board reviewed and approved the study protocol (IRB00008763). Youth and young adult participants read an information sheet on the first page of the survey and clicked a button indicating they agreed to take the survey. We had a waiver of parental consent.

    • Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.