Alaska young adults tripled e-cigarette use in recent five-year period, report says

Juneau, Alaska (Alaska Beacon) – Alaska posted the nation’s highest fee of improve in digital cigarette use by younger adults from 2016 to 2021, in line with a report monitoring patterns in all of the states.

The speed of e-cigarette use by Alaskans in that age group greater than tripled, from 4.8% in 2019 – the bottom fee within the nation on the time — to fifteen.8% in 2021, in line with the report.

The report was compiled by HealthAdvisor, an organization owned by insurance coverage marketer Tranzact. The report makes use of information from the Heart for Illness Management and Prevention’s Behavioral Threat Issue Surveillance System.

Nationally, e-cigarette use, often known as vaping, elevated dramatically throughout these years for younger adults, in line with the report. In 2016, 9.6% of Individuals between 18 and 24 years previous used e-cigarettes, in line with the report; that jumped to 19.8% in 2021, roughly doubling.

The HealthAdvisor report has findings just like these within the 2022 Alaska Tobacco Details replace launched in December by the Alaska Division of Well being. That report, which centered on a youthful age group, stated that a few quarter of Alaska highschool college students frequently used e-cigarettes in 2019 and almost half had tried vaping no less than as soon as.

A invoice geared toward curbing youth e-cigarette use is being thought-about by the Alaska Legislature. The measure, Senate Invoice 89, would increase the authorized age for buy of e-cigarette merchandise from the present 19 to 21. It could additionally impose Alaska’s first state tax on e-cigarette merchandise.  Though municipalities across the state impose taxes on e-cigarette merchandise, the state has not modified its tobacco taxes since 2006, a time earlier than vaping merchandise turned broadly used.

The invoice is sponsored by Senate President Gary Stevens, R-Kodiak. It’s pending within the Senate Labor and Commerce Committee, the place it’s scheduled to get its subsequent listening to on April 21.

Lawmakers final yr handed an analogous invoice that was additionally sponsored by Stevens, however Gov. Mike Dunleavy vetoed it, citing opposition to the tax provision. The tax construction on this yr’s invoice is totally different from that within the invoice vetoed by Dunleavy.