CDC 2019 Smoking & Vaping Data

 

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has released data from the 2019 National Health Interview Survey (NHIS).  After a short delay, during which I caused the agency to correct an error in their release (here), I can now present the latest figures on smoking and vaping.  Like last year, our government has had the 2019 data for months but has not released any findings.

The prevalence of current smoking was 13.6%, which was not a significant change from 2018 (13.7%); that’s 34.1 million.  Twenty-two percent of Americans were former smokers, the same as the year before. 

Prevalence of current vaping increased from 3.2% in 2018, to 4.3% in 2019.  That translates to about 10.82 million American adult vapers in 2019, up from 8.07 million the year before.  That is the second annual increase and it represents the largest number of vapers since the CDC started tracking e-cigarette use in 2014.

The 10.82 million adult vapers includes 4 million current vapers who are also current smokers.  Think about this: If America’s public health leaders abandoned their war on vaping and instead adopted their British counterparts’ practice of speaking honestly about vastly safer vaping, these 4 million smokers might become completely smoke-free. That would result in an unprecedented smoking decline of 11.7%.    

Despite the misinformation campaign against smoke-free substitutes, the number of current vapers who were former smokers increased from 3.04 million in 2018, to 4.27 million in 2019.  That is over one million more than the year before, and the highest number since tracking started. 

Note that there were 2.55 million never smokers who vaped in 2019, up from 1.71 million the year before.  In addition, the age profile shifted, becoming a little older.  In 2018, over two-thirds of this group were 18-24 years old, dropping to 58 percent in 2019.  About one quarter were 25-34 years old, and ten percent were 35-44 years old. 

Tobacco and nicotine prohibitionists in government and elsewhere continue to portray vaping as dangerous and evil.  Despite this, the number of Americans using this vastly safer smoke-free nicotine delivery system continues to grow, but much too slowly.  The disgraceful and unethical campaign against these products continues to bias smokers against safer options.

 

With the National Health Interview Survey, Never Smokers May Have Smoked

Last week I revealed that, based on the 2018 National Health Interview Survey (NHIS), there were about 8.07 million American adult vapers, up from 6.9 million in 2017.  I noted that there were 1.71 million vapers who were never smokers, which is also a substantial increase from the prior year – and potentially troubling.  Let’s take a closer look.

First, it’s important to understand how the NHIS defines never smokers.  They are not necessarily cigarette virgins; they just never smoked 100 cigarettes in their life, which is the cutoff for ever smokers. 

The NHIS never smoker definition includes those who smoked up to five packs.  In contrast, the FDA-funded Population Assessment of Tobacco and Health (PATH) survey asks more detailed questions that allow us to distinguish between people who truly never smoked from those who smoked fewer than 100 cigarettes.  We called the latter group triers in our comprehensive study of e-cigarette users published in Nicotine & Tobacco Research.  We documented that almost all so-called never smokers were, in fact, current or former cigarette triers.

Further examination of the 2018 NHIS reveals that about three-quarters of the so-called never smoking vapers (1.31 million) used the products some days; the rest were daily users.  About 70% were 18-24 years old, and 20% were age 25-34 years.  Thirty-one percent had smoked a cigar, 3.5% had used smokeless tobacco, and 12% had used both products.  Forty-one percent had at least one episode of binge drinking in the month prior to the survey (that is, 5+ drinks for men, and 4+ for women). 

In summary, many current vapers who never smoked in the 2018 NHIS were young, had used other tobacco products, probably had smoked cigarettes and consumed alcohol.  As I have noted previously, these characteristics refute the claim that vaping is attracting tobacco virgins and creating a new generation of nicotine addicts.