The lung organisation has launched a new effort with the goal of lowering the number of Island teenagers who use e-cigarettes. An association team and a nursing faculty team from UPEI visited 19 schools in the province this autumn to talk to Grade 7 students about vaping.
The programme, according to Julia Hartley, director of operations for the Lung Association of Nova Scotia and P.E.I., tries to discourage young people from starting the habit in the first place.
The average age of Islanders who start vaping, according to studies conducted a few years ago, is 15 12, she told Laura Chapin of Island Morning.
We had the impression that we should contact them before they began vaping.
According to a survey conducted in 2018, Hartley said that approximately 40% of Island students in grades 7 through 12 had vaped in the previous 30 days. She is worried about a variety of behaviours, though, not only vaping.
Now, she added, “youth smoking is at its highest level.”
“I believe that many people do not perceive the link between vaping and smoking, but we are absolutely witnessing increases,” the author said.
Nearly 16% of high school students on the Island smoke, which is double the national rate, according to the most recent Canadian Student Tobacco, Alcohol and Drugs Survey conducted in 2018.
Fourth-year nursing student Alyssa Cahill attended the vaping education workshops. She was not shocked by the statistics because she had attended Island High School previously.
The majority of the folks she was around when she was in high school, according to her, “started vaping at some point or another.”
“A lot of individuals assume that vaping on the weekends or occasionally won’t be a problem, but it soon develops into an addiction, becomes used daily, and quickly spirals out of control.”
The in-class discussions included the substances found in vaping products, their pricing, and health dangers. EVALI, or E-cigarette or Vaping use-Associated Lung Injury, is a condition that increases the danger of vaping, according to Hartley, even if the long-term health effects of vaping are not yet as well established as the effects of smoking.
She noted that even after just a year of vaping, the teenagers she and her team spoke with saw that their lungs were weaker.
We don’t have the statistics because vaping only became popular in the early 2000s, but there is enough evidence to support this claim, according to the researcher.
Following the in-class lessons, students were polled. 76% of the 1,250 participants in the study stated they would be less inclined to attempt vaping, and 85% said they had a better awareness of the risks.
$10,000 in public health funding that the lung association received last year was used to support the programme. If they can continue to receive financing, the group, according to Hartley, plans to continue the sessions with Grade 7 children.
Ref: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/prince-edward-island/pei-lung-association-education-teen-vaping-1.6675603
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