We need to protect minors from the rapid spread of the use of nicotine 'puff' bars

The ACT shares the results of a survey of teenagers aged 13 to 16 on perceptions and uses of disposable flavoured electronic cigarettes, better known as 'Puff Bars' and calls for an immediate ban of these products.

Puff bars, or puffs, are disposable e-cigarettes, available in a wide variety of sweet and fruity flavours (e.g., strawberry ice or marshmallow), with a packaging that is particularly attractive to young people. The nicotine content of the e-liquid is variable and may contain up to 20 mg/ml of nicotine salts. Some brands, produced outside the European Union but sold in France (especially on the Internet) may contain up to 50 mg/ml. In France, puffs are sold in tobacconists, some supermarkets and on the Internet, and their price varies from €8 to €12 for 500 to 600 puffs (the equivalent of two packs of cigarettes in terms of puffs for a price lower than that of a single pack). 

The rapid spread of the use of puffs among teenagers, especially in secondary schools, despite the ban on sales of this product to minors in France raises fears of an epidemic of nicotine dependence and a possible gateway effect from these products to tobacco and smoking. Indeed, the nicotine contained in these disposable e-cigarettes is a major concern, as the brain of teenagers is particularly vulnerable to it and dependence can develop within a few weeks of use. 

The French ACT-Alliance contre le tabac and BVA, an international research and consulting group have been the first to survey French teenagers aged 13 to 16 about their perception and use of these flavoured disposable e-cigarettes. This survey confirms the sense of a sudden craze for these products among very young teenagers: 13% of them have already tested puff bars and 9% say they have already bought it. `

Puff bars arrived on the French market in 2021 and are becoming increasingly popular among secondary school students: two thirds of teenagers aged 13 to 16 have already heard of the product and more than one third of them state that they know exactly what it is. 

Even though the sale of this product is forbidden to minors, a higher proportion of teenagers say they have already bought a puff (9%, i.e. almost 1 in 10) compared to electronic cigarettes (7%) or traditional cigarettes (6%). The purchase is perceived as relatively easy, since a quarter of them believe that it is easy to buy them. 

Regarding the pattern of use of this product, half of the adolescents who have heard of the Puff indicate that it is consumed mainly at school, which is prohibited, or after school, rather than during outings or evenings with friends (29%) and during activities outside of school (24%). For more than half of the teenagers who have heard of Puff bars, the original and fruity flavours available is the first argument that pushes them to try this product. 

The desire to try this product is also influenced by their peers: among the teenagers who have already tested this device, 44% did so because they saw many people using it and 50% tested it because their own friends were using it.

The entertaining aspect of the product highlighted by the respondents is also amplified by social networks: 30% of adolescents declare that they would like to use puff bars when they see it on digital platforms. 

This raises the question of the sale conditions of this product. In addition to official websites that offer these products without any age verification, many teenagers buy them through social networks (mainly TikTok and Snapchat), often at attractive prices.  Foreign sites also offer the possibility of having puffs delivered with nicotine levels well above the EU limit (up to 50mg/ml). Often these sites do not offer any indication of the ingredients contained in the products.

Although they say they are aware of the addiction that this device can cause, teenagers seem to be unaware of all the risks induced by its use: if 76% of them describe puff bars a "dangerous" product, the majority of them put the risks into perspective by evaluating it as "rather dangerous" (48%) rather than "very dangerous" (28%). 

In terms of environmental impact, the puff is another waste that adds up to the 4,500 billion cigarette butts thrown into the environment each year. These single-use products contain heavy metal (lithium) batteries, electronic circuits, plastic and liquid residues and nicotine, all of which are massive and dangerous sources of waste. Finally, these types of products often do not provide any information on how to dispose of them after use and on the possibilities of recycling them. While some manufacturers claim that their products are recyclable (e.g. Wpuff), there are no verifiable sources or independent labels to support this claim and constitute a typical example of their greenwashing techniques. 

The banning of these disposable e-cigarette is therefore essential from a health and environmental perspective if we do not want to see this pediatric nicotine addiction epidemic accelerate. Following our call, a deputy announced that she had filed a bill to ban the sale of this product on the French territory. Supported by several deputies, this action shows that our messages, alerting on the sanitary and environmental threats of these products, were heard.