Juul stops selling some flavors? But not the ones that use the most-Ars Technica

Zoom / Cr me brulee getting set on fire.

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Leading e-cigarette maker Juul on Thursday announced it was immediately suspending the sale of some of its flavored products, mango, Fruit, Creme (cr me brulee) and Cucumber.

It is noteworthy that mint and menthol flavored products are not included in the packaging of extinguished flavors.

The move is ostensibly to ease growing alarm over the spike of vaping among teenswho strongly prefer flavored products. About 25% of high school seniors reported recent e-cigarette use in a health survey this year, up from 11% in 2017. About 12% of students said this year that they used the products on a daily basis.Officials have largely blamed that surge on Juul, which dominates the US market. As youth vaping skyrocketed between 2017 and 2018, Juul saw its sales rise 783%. Federal regulators and lawmakers have accused the company of making unsubstantiated claims about the safety of its products and directly marketing them to teens.

In September, the trump administration announced it planned to ban all flavored products to address what the food and drug Administration has called a vaping epidemic among young people.

Soon after, Juul announced that its CEO was stepping down, and that it was ending all U.S. advertising and lobbying.

In today’s announcement, Juuls new CEO KC Crosthwaite said we need to reset the vaping category by earning the trust of the community and work together with regulators, politicians and stakeholders to combat underage use by providing an alternative for adult Smokers.

Before taking a position at Juul, Crosthwaite was Director of growth at Altria Group Inc., formerly Philip Morris Companies Inc.

The stumbling block for Juuls latest move to combat underage use is that the banned flavors are not the ones Teens use most often the rest of the flavors, mint and menthol, are.

According to Federal data, of all high school students who used e-cigarettes between 2017 and 2018, nearly 68% reported using flavors of any kind. But in the same batch of high school vapers, just over 51% said they used mint and menthol products. That’s why Federal officials indicated in September that they would seek to ban mint and menthol flavors, as well as fruit and dessert flavors.

Data shows that young people are turning to flavored e-cigarettes, including mint and menthol, health and human services Secretary Alex Azar said in an oval office meeting at the time.

The plan has prompted some e-cigarette companies to explore legal challenges to such a ban, according to the new York times. But in today’s announcement, Juul said it will fully support and co-comply with the final policy when effective.

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