Health
Young vaper who required double lung transplant shares warnings as e-cigarette sales rise
MINNEAPOLIS – E-cigarette sales are climbing — and it’s primarily young people who are getting hooked.
Those between the ages of 18 and 24 vape the most, but 9% of youth between 11 and 15 years old say they’re regular vapors, according to data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
One of them, 22-year-old Jackson Allard of North Dakota, almost lost his life due to his vaping habit — and now he’s warning others of the dangers.
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Besides leading to addiction, vaping can cause permanent lung damage, according to the CDC.
Last October, Allard developed parainfluenza, which led to pneumonia and then acute respiratory distress syndrome. His lungs were full of fluid.
Jackson Allard, pictured, was in the hospital for three months before he was healthy enough to qualify as a transplant recipient. Now he meets weekly with other lung transplant recipients for rehab. “I’m the youngest person by far, so it’s a little weird,” Allard said. (Doreen Hurlburt )
“I was really sick, barely able to sleep, puking constantly,” Allard told Fox News.
The young man was on ECMO, a form of life support, for 70 days.
“I had a 1% chance to live,” Allard said.
His lungs were damaged so badly that in Jan. 2024, he received a double lung transplant — a rare procedure for someone his age.
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“The first thing that went through my head was, ‘Can I live a normal life after this?’” Allard said.
Allard and his family live in Fargo, North Dakota, but they’re renting an apartment in Minneapolis while he recovers from his transplant.
Twice a week, he attends rehabilitation and gets weekly bloodwork. He also gets his PICC line, a tube connected to his veins for long-term medication, cleaned each week. Allard takes 30 pills a day and his family is responsible for giving him his IV medication.
“I had a 1% chance to live.”
Based on his doctors’ input, Allard and his grandmother, Doreen Hurlburt, believe vaping is to blame for his lung failure.
“When I first started vaping, I was probably 14. I was pretty much non-stop doing it,” Allard said. He later started using a weed vape as well.
“I told my friend who smokes weed, I was like, ‘Be careful with that,’” Allard said, suggesting that people use marijuana gummies instead of vapes.
“It’s just scary to know that we can make a misstep and cause something bad to happen,” said Doreen Hurlburt, Jackson’s grandmother, pictured here. (Mills Hayes/Fox News)
His grandmother, Doreen Hurlburt, said she complained daily about Jackson’s vaping habits.
“Multiple doctors said, ‘If you smoke cigarettes for 50 years, we’ll see you with lung cancer, and if you vape for five years, we’ll see you with permanent lung damage,’” Hurlburt told Fox News.
Allard can’t drink alcohol or smoke, and his weakened immune system means he has to avoid big crowds.
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Dr. Brooke Moore, a pediatric pulmonologist at Children’s Minnesota, did not treat Allard but often sees patients with vaping-related lung injuries.
“We’ve seen kids who have been vaping for short periods of time, and not necessarily with heavy use, come in with pretty significant lung injury from that,” Moore told Fox News.
Most of Allard’s friends just turned 21 and all go out to the bars — but after his double lung transplant, he’s not allowed to drink or be in crowded places. “It’s the social aspect that I’m kind of worried about,” he told Fox News. (Mills Hayes/Fox News)
The majority of the patients Moore sees with vaping-related issues are between 16 and 19 years old.
Some patients have lung injury and others have milder respiratory symptoms.
“We’ve done a very good job of educating youth about not starting to smoke traditional tobacco-based cigarettes,” Moore said.
“With vaping products, we don’t have as much long-term data, but in the short term, the risk seems to be as high as cigarettes — and I would argue in some cases worse.”
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Moore said her patients typically vape THC and nicotine.
“It doesn’t seem to be that vaping just nicotine or just THC is less of a risk for lung disease than one or the other,” she said.
Most vaping patients have some underlying mental health concerns, such as anxiety, depression or a combination of those, the doctor noted.
Dr. Brook Moore, pictured here, said patients will come in with a cough and shortness of breath due to vaping. “They’ve created flavors and advertising that mimics a lot of the things that kids, teenagers and young adults like to use,” she said about the manufacturers. (Mills Hayes/Fox News)
“They’re using their vape products to self-medicate,” Moore said. “It shows there is a much bigger issue at play than just people vaping to vape.”
In 2019, there was an outbreak of e-cigarette or vaping product use-associated lung injury, or EVALI. Those cases were linked to vitamin E acetate in vaping products.
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As of Feb. 2020, more than 2,800 patients had been admitted to various hospitals in the U.S. due to EVALI, with 68 deaths reported.
But in 2020, the CDC stopped tracking EVALI cases.
That’s when Johns Hopkins Children’s Center Dr. Christy Sadreameli started to pay more attention.
Many of the vape products commonly sold are “kind of on the market illegally,” a doctor warned. (iStock)
“If you were to ask me how many cases of EVALI happen every year in the U.S., we don’t know that anymore,” Sadreameli told Fox News Digital.
“It’s definitely still out there. And I’m still concerned about it.”
Many of the vape products commonly sold are “kind of on the market illegally,” Sadreameli added.
“They’re on the market without approval and without undergoing review.”
“They haven’t gone through the FDA review or approval process, and it’s hard to enforce something like that. These things were already being sold,” she continued.
“They’re kind of on the market without approval and without undergoing review. So that’s kind of messed up.”
Symptoms of vaping-related lung injury include coughing, shortness of breath, chest pain, fever or gastrointestinal symptoms, according to WebMD.
If people who often vape are experiencing a combination of those symptoms, they should see a doctor as soon as possible, experts advise.
Patients who want to quit can work with their doctor to make a plan.
There are also cessation support groups and programs available.
For more Health articles, visit www.foxnews.com/health.
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An American woman who may have been exposed to hantavirus on board the MV Hondius cruise ship is now being forced to quarantine at a facility in Omaha, Nebraska.
Angela Perryman, 47, anticipated having to stay at the National Quarantine Unit for a short time after arriving last week, but on Monday she was served with a federal order to remain quarantined for at least two more weeks, she shared with The New York Times.
The order mandates that Perryman remains in the facility until May 31, which would be a total of 21 days after her arrival. Officials told her that any attempts to leave could result in law enforcement involvement, she said.
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“They won’t let us isolate at home,” Perryman, who lives in Ecuador but has a home in South Florida, told the news outlet. “We’re being kept in a secured facility and threatened if we try to leave.”
U.S. passengers from the cruise ship MV Hondius, affected by a hantavirus outbreak, arrive at the University of Nebraska Medical Center Davis Global Center, in Omaha, Nebraska, on May 11, 2026. (Nikos Frazier/Omaha World-Herald via Getty Images)
The woman shared that she received a negative hantavirus test result and is not experiencing symptoms. However, she said she did briefly speak with a passenger who later died from the disease.
The federal order, which the passenger shared with the Times, states that it could “constitute a probable source of infection to other people” if Perryman were to leave the facility to travel to another state.
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After receiving a medical review within 72 hours, Perryman was told she can appeal the order. She told the Times that she plans to take legal action.
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The quarantine unit includes 20 single-occupancy rooms with negative air pressure systems and en suite bathroom facilities, along with exercise equipment and Wi-Fi connectivity, according to the University of Nebraska Medical Center’s Global Center for Health Security website.
The Davis Global Center at the University of Nebraska Medical Center campus, which holds the National Quarantine Unit, is seen on May 11, 2026, in Omaha, Nebraska. (Getty Images)
The quarantine order — issued under federal public health authority — was reportedly approved by Jay Bhattacharya, the acting head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
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Fox News Digital reached out to the CDC requesting comment.
Including Perryman, a total of 18 American passengers from the MV Hondius have been monitored at the quarantine unit since last week.
Medical staff direct some of the last passengers to be evacuated from the MV Hondius on May 11, 2026, in Tenerife, part of the Canary Islands, Spain. (Chris McGrath/Getty Images)
Seven other passengers who left the ship and returned home prior to the outbreak’s discovery are being monitored by their state and local health departments, per the CDC.
“The reason they’re watching these passengers so carefully is that the incubation period can be very long — up to six weeks — and when symptoms hit, patients can deteriorate very rapidly,” Dr. Marc Siegel, Fox News senior medical analyst, said during a recent episode of “The Faulkner Focus.”
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“This is not something that spreads easily like COVID, but because the Andes strain has rare person-to-person transmission, public health officials are being extremely cautious,” he added.
At least three people linked to the outbreak aboard the ship have died, while additional passengers have been sickened, according to the World Health Organization.
“This is not something that spreads easily like COVID, but because the Andes strain has rare person-to-person transmission, public health officials are being extremely cautious.”
The federal government last imposed a large-scale quarantine order in January 2020, when nearly 200 Americans evacuated from Wuhan, China, the epicenter of the COVID-19 outbreak. They were required to remain in isolation for two weeks at the March Air Reserve Base in Riverside County, California, per the CDC.
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“Typically, we don’t hold people against their will unless there is no alternative,” Jennifer Nuzzo, director of the pandemic center at Brown University’s School of Public Health, told The Times.
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The Murdoch Children’s Research Institute (MCRI) in Australia will receive a $5 million federal grant to launch a pioneering research team for children’s health.
The grant was announced at MCRI’s 40th anniversary gala in Melbourne on Saturday night.
“For 40 years, MCRI has been a global leader in children’s health research,” Prime Minister Anthony Albanese told guests at the gala, which was attended by 300 of Australia’s most esteemed medical experts, political leaders, philanthropists and sports luminaries.
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“My government is proud to partner with MCRI, so our world-leading researchers have the best opportunities to support healthier childhoods for Australians now and into the future.”
The $5 million will directly support medical research aimed at preventing numerous childhood conditions, including obesity, heart disease, mental health issues and disabilities.
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese speaks at the MCRI gala. (Penny Stephens/Murdoch Children’s Research Institute)
Also announced at the gala, a lead donation from Sarah and Lachlan Murdoch will launch the Horizon Fund — a permanent endowment for MCRI aimed at funding long-term children’s health research and future medical breakthroughs.
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The goal is for the fund to raise between $50 million and $100 million in its first year and to reach $200 million within five years.
The fund is designed to back researchers’ immediate priorities while safeguarding long-term capital for future medical breakthroughs in children’s health.
Pictured above, Sarah Murdoch (MCRI co-chair); Jodie Haydon (wife of Prime Minister Albanese); Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese; Kathryn North (MCRI director); and Patrick Houlihan (MCRI chair). (Christopher Hopkins/Murdoch Children’s Research Institute)
In 2020, the Murdochs donated $5 million to establish a perpetual fellowship supporting leading researchers in fields including stem cell technology and genomic precision medicine.
Co-founded in 1986 by philanthropist and child health advocate Dame Elisabeth Murdoch and pediatrician and genetics pioneer Professor David Danks, MCRI comprises 1,800 scientists, researchers and clinicians.
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“Dame Elisabeth’s leadership, along with her values, shaped both the direction and the ethos of the Institute we were to become – for all children to live a healthy and fulfilled life,” said Sarah Murdoch, who is Dame Elisabeth Murdoch’s granddaughter-in-law and MCRI’s global ambassador and board co-chair.
Sarah Murdoch (MCRI co-chair) is pictured with Kathryn North (MCRI director) at the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute 40th Anniversary Gala at the State Library Melbourne. (Penny Stephens/Murdoch Children’s Research Institute)
“With the generosity of a remarkable group of founding donors alongside the Murdoch family – Sir Jack Brockhoff, the Miller family, and The Scobie and Claire Mackinnon Trust – the foundations were laid for an Institute designed to bring our brightest minds, to serve all children, not only in that moment, but for generations to come,” Ms. Murdoch added.
“I see what is possible when foresight, science, commitment, collaboration and heartfelt generosity come together,” she emphasized.
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“Because behind every breakthrough is a child — a family desperate for answers. A future changed because of the commitment by so many.”
MCRI Director Kathryn North expressed appreciation at the gala to the prime minister for the $5 million grant.
“From the beginning, MCRI has been guided by a simple but powerful purpose: to give all children the opportunity to live a healthy and fulfilled life,” said the MCRI director. (MCRI)
“From the beginning, MCRI has been guided by a simple but powerful purpose: to give all children the opportunity to live a healthy and fulfilled life,” North said.
“It reflects a belief that good health is the foundation for a full life, and that opportunity should never be limited by circumstance.”
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Professor North mentioned the Institute’s focus on developing therapies for previously incurable diseases.
“We are harnessing the power of human stem cell technologies to grow heart patches, functional mini kidneys, blood and immune cells … to better understand disease, and to develop regenerative therapies using a patient’s own stem cells to replace organ transplants and the risk of rejection,” she said.
The Institute’s next challenge is to address chronic conditions like asthma, obesity, allergies and mental health conditions that can persist for decades. (iStock)
The Institute’s next challenge, North said, is to address chronic conditions like asthma, obesity, allergies and mental health conditions that can persist for decades.
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“These are big problems that will require significant and ongoing support,” she said. “Through our work globally, we are helping communities raise their expectations to both deliver and receive the sort of healthcare we take for granted.”
“Our ambition now is to translate these partnerships into population-scale solutions that improve the lives of millions of children worldwide,” North added. “This is not simply the next chapter for MCRI – it is the work of building the future of children’s health.”
FDA fast-tracks pancreatic cancer drug daraxonrasib
Family and emergency medicine physician Dr. Janette Nesheiwat discusses how artificial intelligence could help detect pancreatic cancer earlier and the FDA fast-tracking the drug daraxonrasib on ‘Fox Report.’
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A new drug for pancreatic cancer is showing promise in early testing.
Daraxonrasib is a daily pill designed to block cancer signals linked to the RAS gene. It has now finished an early-stage clinical trial — the first time it was tested in people — to evaluate both its safety and effectiveness.
The clinical trial, led by the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and published in The New England Journal of Medicine, tested the drug in 168 patients with advanced pancreatic cancer whose tumors had mutations in the RAS gene. All study participants had previously received at least one chemotherapy treatment.
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The drug is designed to block multiple active cancer signals that help tumor cells grow. This is especially important because more than 90% of pancreatic cancers carry these harmful mutations, researchers said.
Existing and older drugs that target RAS mutations only work on certain types that are uncommon in pancreatic cancer, such as KRAS mutations.
Daraxonrasib is a daily pill designed to block cancer signals linked to the RAS gene. It has now finished an early-stage clinical trial to evaluate its safety and effectiveness. (iStock)
At the 300-milligram dose — the amount that will be used in larger phase 3 trials — about 30% of patients saw a positive response, researchers noted. Overall, about 90% of patients had their cancer either shrink or stop getting worse.
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There were some side effects reported — most commonly rash, mouth inflammation, nausea and diarrhea.
Lead investigator Dr. Brian Wolpin, director of the Hale Family Center for Pancreatic Cancer Research at Dana-Farber, commented in a press release statement that this development could change the future of cancer care.
About 90% of patients treated with the drug experienced disease control, meaning their cancer was reduced or stabilized. (iStock)
“If supported by data from future clinical trials, daraxonrasib would be a targeted therapy relevant to nearly all patients with advanced pancreatic cancer,” he said.
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“This trial provides the first published data showing the safety and broad activity of a RAS(ON) multi-selective inhibitor in pancreatic cancer,” Wolpin went on. “If it proves effective in larger clinical trials, it would signify a substantial shift in how this disease is treated.”
In an interview with Fox News Digital, the researcher claimed that daraxonrasib represents “one of the most promising therapy advances we’ve seen in pancreatic cancer.”
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This is especially significant since pancreatic cancer has had “very few effective therapies” in the past, Wolpin noted.
“The study also showed disease control in approximately 90% of patients with metastatic pancreatic cancer, which is extremely exciting,” he added.
The study does not prove daraxonrasib is superior to standard treatment of chemotherapy, researchers noted. (iStock)
Wolpin noted that while side effects were common, most patients were able to tolerate treatment with “supportive care measures, and very few patients needed to stop therapy due to side effects.”
As this was a phase 1/2 study, it does not “definitively prove” the superiority of daraxonrasib compared to chemotherapy, Wolpin added.
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“The study did not include a randomized control arm that directly compared daraxonrasib with chemotherapy,” he said. “That being said, the results for daraxonrasib looked substantially better than what we have seen in prior clinical trials of chemotherapy in patients with previously treated metastatic pancreatic cancer.”
It also remains unclear how the drug may perform earlier in the disease, as the trial included patients who had already received prior treatments.
“Additional research is needed to determine how best to sequence or combine therapies to provide the most durable responses and cures,” the lead investigaror sid. (iStock)
For patients and families affected by pancreatic cancer, Wolpin noted that daraxonrasib signals “real momentum” toward effective treatments, but it is still investigational and is not a cure.
“Pancreatic cancer remains a challenging disease, and additional research is needed to determine how best to sequence or combine therapies to provide the most durable responses and cures,” he said.
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Brian Slomovitz, director of gynecologic oncology and co-chair of the Cancer Research Committee at Mount Sinai Medical Center in Miami Beach, applauded this development in a separate interview with Fox News Digital.
“We are anxiously awaiting the upcoming plenary presentation of RASolute 302 at the ASCO meeting later this month,” said the expert, who was not involved in the study. “Greater than 90% of pancreatic cancers have activation of kRAS, which is a major factor in the development and progression of these cancers.”
“Doubling the survival time in pretreated patients is unprecedented.”
“If the full dataset results that will be reported later this month confirm what was earlier released, I believe this will be one of the most important breakthroughs in all solid tumors,” Slomovitz went on. “Doubling the survival time in pretreated patients is unprecedented.”
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The doctor added that the “magnitude of benefit” could “reshape the treatment landscape” and “establish a new standard of care.”
“We will need to evaluate the full dataset for efficacy and safety,” Slomovitz added. “I am more than cautiously optimistic, and I am truly excited for our patients and their families that suffer from this dreadful disease.”
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