Teen Vaping: The Cloudy Crisis Part 1
A new trend is sweeping across our schools, and it’s only getting more popular. Vaping is become a wildly popular trend, with more and more teen users everyday.
Studies show, Generation Z, or iGen, the school aged kids right now, are suppose to be the generation to do away with smoking cigarettes.
However, it appears they might only be trading regular cigarettes, for their electronic counterparts. That might be creating a dangerous future.
KRDO crews went looking for kids who use these devices in southern Colorado.
We found, outside of virtually any high school, dozens of kids can be found with e-cigarettes and vaping devices.
They say, vaping is the new alternative to smoking regular cigarettes.
“It’s definitely become the biggest thing so far. You don’t really see people walking around with cigs anymore, but more vape,” said one 15-year-old student.
We wanted to know: why vaping?
Many of these students say other students got them into it.
“One of my friends was doing it and I tried it and said, ‘that taste good,’ so I just kind of started vaping my friends,” said another student.
Perhaps the most surprising, is how old they were when they took their first puff, with most saying they tried it when they were 13 or 14 years old.
While they are not suppose to be able to buy it until they are 18 years old, these kids are also getting creative.
“So I was in a facebook group and I was just telling people I was 18 so I didn’t get them in trouble and I didn’t get in trouble,” said one vaping student.
In the latest data available for Colorado, 46 percent of teens have smoked an e-cigarette, compared to about 1 in 5 teens that have tried regular cigarettes.
One thing that makes it easier for kids to use inconspicuously is the vaping devices themselves. There are now several types and styles of vaping and e-cigarette devices, and they do not always look the way you might think. One device, called a Juul, is barely larger than a standard USB drive, make it harder for parents or teachers to detect.
These devices can go from about $10 to $20, not including refills, to hundreds of dollars –depending on the quality.
Part 2 of our series investigates the health risks of using vaping devices. Tune into KRDO NewsChannel 13 at 10 p.m. on Tuesday.
