Another Kentucky school district goes tobacco-free and e-cigarette free; efforts largely led by students in Webster County

The Webster County school board voted unanimously May 26 to make all district property, vehicles and buildings officially tobacco-free, Matt Hughes reports for the Webster County Journal-Enterprise. As in some other school districts, efforts for the ban were largely led by students.

“This is something the Youth Experiencing Success Youth Council has been working on for years,” said board member Mickey Dunbar, who has worked closely with Youth Empowerment Services. “I think it is very important that we educate our students' minds and educate them about their bodies.”

The ban will go into effect July 1 and includes all tobacco products, including vapor devices, commonly known as e-cigarettes. It also extends to school-sponsored trips, all sporting events and all school functions.

“I will enjoy being able to walk out of a basketball game without having to navigate a gauntlet of cigarette smoke,” Dunbar told Hughes. “I think this will set a good precedence for the other schools in our area.” Webster County is in the West Kentucky Coalfield.

The YES Youth Council and its adult sponsor first approached the board last fall, and said that while supportive, the board voiced concerns that the community would not be supportive, especially during ballgames. But since then, Hughes said, board members "have gotten a lot of positive feedback from the community."

As of May 2015, Kentucky reported 40 tobacco-free school districts, which include 500 individual schools, according to the Tobacco Free Schools Kentucky website. This amounts to 40 percent of Kentucky's students.

Bourbon Co. teen named South's top youth anti-tobacco advocate for his efforts in pushing for county smoking ban

Tyler Boyle (Photo from
Lexington Herald-Leader)

Tyler Boyle, a Bourbon County High School senior and president of Students Making A Change in the Community, was named the South Region Youth Advocate of the Year by the Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids for his efforts to push a smoking ban in Bourbon County, Lashana Harney reports for the Lexington Herald-Leader.

Boyle has been a part of SMACC since it was re-established in 2013. The club is a place for youth voices to be heard on smoking issues, with the ultimate goal of a countywide smoking ban -- but in the meantime, working for a school regulation that would ban electronic cigarettes.

The smoking ban has yet to pass, but the schools have added e-cigarettes to their comprehensive tobacco policy, which banned tobacco products of any kind on school grounds.

Boyle told the Herald-Leader that he applied for the award in hopes of bringing more attention to the anti-tobacco cause in his county, which has a long history of tobacco production and sales.

"I applied for this award because of all of the work that I've done in my home community and state for tobacco control," he told Harney. "I thought that if I could make national attention, maybe, it would make the officials in my community take this issue more seriously."

Boyle said that he was honored to receive the award, which was presented at a gala in Washington, D.C., in mid-May. He plans to attend a symposium sponsored by the Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids in Washington in July and the Philip Morris Cos. international shareholder meeting next May.

Boyle told Harney that sometimes he gets frustrated because change is slow to take place, but the will to keep pushing forward always comes back.

"After attending the award gala, I was revitalized and I'm ready for the next step in tobacco control," he said.

Boyle will attend Vassar College in the fall to study political science with a focus on advocacy work and said he would continue his work with the Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids.

"Tobacco advocacy is something near to my heart," Boyle said. "Vassar is actually going smoke free in July 2015. So, I plan to work hard to implement and support their new policy."

Even nicotine-free electronic cigarettes can damage lungs; parents urged to warn teens about dangers of e-cig smoking

Kentucky has one of the nation's highest smoking rates, but electronic cigarettes, or e-cigs, are becoming more popular. These battery-powered vaporizers produce a vapor that usually does not contain nicotine. Some have claimed that e-cigs can help people quit smoking because the amount of nicotine can be reduced until it isn't present in the vapor. However, new research shows that other substances in e-cigs may damage the lungs.

Research has found that nicotine in any form damages the endothelial cells that line the lungs, and can cause them to become inflamed or injured. The new research has found that e-cigarette solutions without nicotine contain other substances like acrolein, which damage the lungs in other ways.

"This research reports that components found in commercially available e-cigarette solutions and vapors generated by heating them may cause lung inflammation," said lead researcher Irina Petrache. Long-term effects haven't yet been studied, but the results of this study warn that e-cig inhalation may involve adverse effects on lung health, she said.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention research shows that e-cigarette use among middle and high school students has tripled. "The development and marketing of e-cigarettes has the potential of hooking a whole new generation on nicotine," Garry Sigman, director of the Loyola University Health System Adolescent Medicine Program, said. It's very addictive and can lead to health issues such as lung disease, heart disease, hypertension and nervous system problems, he said.

Sigman said parents need to made sure their children understand that e-cigarettes are just as addictive as other substances. "Nicotine is so addictive that with only a few inhales, it can create an addiction," he said. Because adolescents enjoy and use technology so much, the modern qualities of the e-cigs might make them seem cool. "Setting rules and monitoring behavior is essential to keeping our teens safe," Sigman said.

Teen use of electronic cigarettes has tripled in one year

By Melissa Patrick
Kentucky Health News

The number of middle- and high-school students using electronic cigarettes tripled from 2013 to 2014, surpassing the current use of all teen use of tobacco products, including conventional cigarettes, according to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Data from CDC/CDC National Youth
Tobacco Survey; Image: NPR

The findings came from CDC's 2014 National Youth Tobacco Survey,which found that e-cigarette use by high-school students increased to 13.4 percent in 2014 from 4.5 percent in 2013, and to 3.9 percent in 2014 from 1.1 percent in 2013 for middle-school students. That amounts to 2 million high school students and 450,000 middle school students smoking e-cigarettes.

The report also found that the use of traditional cigarettes remained the same for middle-school students at 7.7 percent, but fell among high-schoolers to 9.2 percent in 2014 from 12.7 percent in 2013, the "lowest level in years," CDC said in a press release.

“We want parents to know that nicotine is dangerous for kids at any age, whether it’s an e-cigarette, hookah, cigarette or cigar,” CDC Director Tom Frieden said. “Adolescence is a critical time for brain development. Nicotine exposure at a young age may cause lasting harm to brain development, promote addiction, and lead to sustained tobacco use.”

There is great debate about how safe e-cigarettes are. Most public-health officials have called for them to be controlled by government regulations, including advertising regulations, and say more controlled studies need to be done to determine their safety.

And while many proponents of e-cigarettes say the devices may be helpful in helping some smokers give up traditional cigarettes and are safer than traditional cigarettes, a recent study published in the American Journal of Public Health says that using electronic cigarettes doesn't help smokers quit, and Brady Dennis of The Washington Post reports that another study, published in the journal Tobacco Control, found that the chemicals used to flavor e-cigarettes could prove unsafe when inhaled over time.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has yet to issue new regulations for e-cigarettes, despite its announced plans to do so last April. Meanwhile, Kentucky enacted a law last year banning the sale of "alternative nicotine products" such as e-cigarettes to minors, and local Kentucky smoking bans have slowly been adding e-cigs to their local ordinances. Several Kentucky schools have also added language to their school policies to include e-cigarettes in their smoking bans, with one school official in Webster County recently saying e-cigarettes are "high on every school system's radar right now."

But not everyone sees this increase in teen use of e-cigarette use as a cause for alarm.

“The CDC should really be jumping for joy at the fact that smoking rates are declining. This is a huge success,” Michael Siegel, a professor and tobacco-control specialist at Boston University’s School of Public Health, told Dennis. “Instead, they are using this as another opportunity to demonize e-cigarettes.”

Siegel said that while minors shouldn't have access to any tobacco products, the CDC numbers also suggest that e-cigarettes are not serving as a gateway to traditional cigarettes and might be diverting them away from them, Dennis reports.

Gregory Conley of the American Vaping Association told NPR that the data, which show a decrease in tobacco smoking by teens as they have increased experimentation with vaping "should be part of the discussion."

Smokers using electronic cigarettes are less likely to quit smoking than those who don't use the devices, California study finds

The sudden increase in use of electronic cigarettes has prompted questions about whether they actually help people quit smoking. A study published online in the American Journal of Public Health found that individuals who use e-cigarettes are actually less likely to quit smoking than those who do not. In Kentucky, 24 percent of adults and 41 percent of those aged 18 to 29 reported using e-cigarettes, according to a Kentucky Health Issues Poll.

The study, conducted by researchers from the University of California San Diego School of Medicine, discovered that smokers who use e-cigs are 59 percent less likely reduce cigarette use and 59 percent less likely to stop smoking altogether, compared to smokers who have not used e-cigs.

"Based on the idea that smokers use e-cigarettes to quit smoking, we hypothesized that smokers who used these products would be more successful in quitting," said Wael Al-Delaimy, professor and chief of the Division of Global Public Health in UC-San Diego's Department of Family Medicine and Public Health. He said the research showed the hypothesis was false, and more studies are required to find out why these people can't stop smoking. "One hypothesis is that smokers are receiving an increase in nicotine dose by using e-cigarettes," he said.

E-cigs don't contain tobacco, but smoking them releases ultra-fine particles and volatile organic compounds such as heavy metals. The study also found that women and those who smoke daily are more likely to have tried e-cigarettes.

Electronic cigarettes are 'high on every school system's radar right now,' Western Ky. school official tells Henderson newspaper

This story has been updated to reflect recent data about teens and e-cigarette use.

School officials in northwestern Kentucky are trying deal with an increase in the use of electronic cigarettes by students, Erin Schmitt reports for The Gleaner in Henderson.

Union County Schools spokeswoman Malinda Beauchamp told Schmitt there had been 16 discipline referrals of students using e-cigarettes at Union County High School and 26 at Union County Middle School this year. There is no data from previous years for comparison, but school officials "have noticed the rise" and want to be proactive in preventing more usage, Beauchamp said.

Schmitt reported on e-cigarette usage at other schools in the region and found 15 to 20 incidents at Henderson County High, but only a few incidents in North Middle School, South Middle School and Central Academy, according to Julie Wischer, public information officer for Henderson County Schools.

The Webster County Schools did not have exact numbers of incidents of usage, but has e-cigarettes listed under its policy as a tobacco product or paraphernalia, Todd Marshall, Webster’s director of pupil personnel, told Schmidt. Though it’s a new issue, Marshall said, “It’s high on every school system’s radar right now.”

A recent report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that the number of high school students who tried e-cigarettes has tripled in one year, to more than 13 percent, while smoking of traditional cigarettes dropped to 9.2 percent from more than 13 percent, CBS News reports.

“Many users of marijuana prefer e-cigs or vapes because it’s smokeless, odorless and easy to hide or conceal,” Henderson County Supt. Patricia Sheffer told Schmitt. “This ‘vaping’ is a concern in our schools and elsewhere among youth, because it can produce a nearly instant ‘high’ with little or no detection."

The preventive measures include: a Facebook message to parents and students from her about the dangers of e-cigarettes, which not only involves nicotine usage, but also marijuana, alcohol and other drugs that can be ingested through the device; updating policies, procedures and the student code of conduct to include prohibitions on e-cigs and vapor devices on school property; a commitment to find out how the student got access to the device; and a required drug and alcohol screening if caught, with parent-paid counseling if the screen is positive.

Newport school board's smoking ban, which includes e-cigarettes, would be 38th among 173 Kentucky school districts

The Newport Independent Board of Education passed the first reading of a proposed smoking ban Wednesday, Jan. 28 after adding electronic cigarettes to the ban.

The ban would prohibit smoking on any school campus, including parking lots, cars and the bus garage, and no smoking will be permitted by any groups who rent or meet on any school properties.

The second reading of the ban will be in February and if passed will go into effect July 1, Patricia A. Scheyer reports for The River City News.

"I do expect that it will pass," Superintendent Kelly Middleton told Scheyer. "I haven't had anyone say anything against passing it, and in fact, I have had a couple of comments in favor of it."

If passed, the "Newport school district will be the 38th school district out of Kentucky's 173 districts to become smoke free, joining Beechwood and Dayton Independent schools locally," Scheyer reports.

Heavy use of e-cigarettes may deliver big doses of formaldehyde, which can be a cause of lung cancer, study suggests

Vapor produced by electronic cigarettes can contain a surprisingly high concentration of formaldehyde—a known carcinogen that can cause lung cancer through prolonged exposure—researchers reported Wednesday in a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine, Rob Stein reports for NPR. (Getty Images by Dan Kilwood)

Use of e-cigarettes among rural teens has risen in recent years, prompting the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to propose rules to give it authority over e-cigarettes, an industry that accounts for about $2.5 billion in annual sales.

"E-cigarettes work by heating a liquid that contains nicotine to create a vapor that users inhale," Stein writes. David Peyton, a chemistry professor at Portland State University who helped conduct the research, told Stein, "We simulated vaping by drawing the vapor—the aerosol—into a syringe, sort of simulating the lungs. That enabled the researchers to conduct a detailed chemical analysis of the vapor. They found something unexpected when the devices were dialed up to their highest settings."

The e-cigarette industry dismissed the report, saying they found formaldehyde only when e-cigarettes were cranked up to their highest voltage levels, Stein writes. Gregory Conley of the American Vaping Association told him, "They clearly did not talk to [people who use e-cigarettes] to understand this. They think, 'Oh, well. If we hit the button for so many seconds and that produces formaldehyde, then we have a new public health crisis to report."

"If you hold the button on an e-cigarette for 100 seconds, you could potentially produce 100 times more formaldehyde than you would ever get from a cigarette," Conley said. "But no human vaper would ever vape at that condition because within one second their lungs would be incredibly uncomfortable." (Read more)

1/4 of Ky. adults say they have tried e-cigs; just over half of adults (but not the e-cig users) want them taxed and regulated

More than four in 10 Kentucky adults under age 30 have tried electronic cigarettes, and the older and better off economically Kentuckians are, the less likely they are to have tried them. Overall, one-fourth of Kentucky adults and 60 percent of current smokers have tried the devices.

Those are major findings of the latest Kentucky Health Issues Poll, which also found that 61 percent Kentucky adults want the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to regulate e-cigarettes and 53 percent want them to be taxed in the same way as traditional cigarettes.

The poll, taken Oct. 8-Nov. 6, has an error margin of plus or minus 2.5 percentage points. It was conducted by the Institute for Policy Research at the University of Cincinnati. A random sample of 1,597 adults from throughout Kentucky was interviewed by telephone, including landlines and cell phones.

The poll was conducted for the Foundation for a Healthy Kentucky and the Cincinnati-based Interact for Health nonprofit. “Last year, Kentucky became one of dozens of states to prohibit the sale of electronic cigarettes to minors,” Susan Zepeda, president and CEO of the foundation, noted in a news release.

The poll didn't ask respondents if they were currently using e-cigarettes, but the data offer some interesting details: Men (29%) were more likely than women (20%) to have used an e-cigarette, and college graduates (14%) and were less likely than others (27%) to have done so. So were residents of the Lexington area, at 16%. Among those who said they previously smoked cigarettes, 19 percent said they had tried the electronic version.

As might be expected, current smokers those who had used an e-cigarette were much less likely to say the devices should be taxed like tobacco cigarettes.

Beshear bans use of tobacco products and e-cigarettes on or near buildings and property the state owns or leases

Gov. Steve Beshear issued an executive order Sept, 4 that soon ban all tobacco products and e-cigarettes from more than 26.4 million square feet of executive branch buildings and grounds on Nov. 20.

All executive-branch buildings are smoke-free inside, but the new ban extends to the use of all tobacco products and e-cigarettes in state-owned or -leased buildings, in state-owned vehicles and on state property.

“Tobacco products have a deadly grip on thousands of Kentuckians. Smoking and tobacco use are the single-biggest causes of preventable illness and death in our state,” Beshear said in a news release. “This policy will protect non-smokers from the effects of secondhand smoke and encourage tobacco users to seek help in quitting.”

Kentucky is only the fifth state to institute such a policy. The release notes that more than 28 percent of adults smoke, leading to 8,000 Kentucky deaths each year from tobacco-related illnesses.

Susan Zepeda, president and CEO of the Foundation for a Healthy Kentucky, said Beshear's move "sends a clear signal that Kentucky is serious about curbing the negative health consequences of smoking, and committed to improving the health of Kentuckians,” said Zepeda. She noted that polls have shown a clear majority of Kentucky adults favor a statewide smoking ban.

The release from Beshear's office said expanding tobacco-free policies to more executive-branch property is aimed at helping achieve his kyhealthnow goal of reducing smoking rates by 10 percent by 2019. Beshear supports a statewide smoking ban and encourages all state and local government facilities, public and private school districts, universities, and businesses to consider limiting use of tobacco products on their properties.

Amy Barkley, Chair of Smoke-free Kentucky, said in the release, “We are hopeful that this policy will motivate the legislature to pass a comprehensive, statewide, smoke-free law that will protect the rest of Kentucky workers from secondhand smoke exposure in all other indoor workplaces.”

More information about the policy, as well as links to tools to stop tobacco use, are available at http://tobacco-free.ky.gov.

Fayette County Board of Health wants to regulate electronic cigarettes, raising some questions

The Lexington-Fayette County Board of Health is discussing ways to restrict the use of electronic cigarettes in public places and strategies to inform people about their potential dangers, Mary Meehan writes for the Lexington Herald-Leader. This continues not only the debate about whether or not e-cigarettes should be regulated the same way as traditional tobacco products but also how much power health boards may have in such matters.

E-cigarettes are battery-powered, and the liquid nicotine turns to vapor that can be inhaled. Though they don't contain tobacco, nicotine is sometimes used as a pesticide and can be harmful to humans as well. The General Assembly recently passed a law regulating e-cigarette sales, making them illegal to minors. The Danville City Commission has already banned the indoor use of e-cigarettes. “The state now classifies them as a tobacco product. What makes them different? By our ordinance, there is no distinction,” City Manager Ron Scott said.

Sometimes advertisements make it seem as though e-cigarettes are a safe alternative to traditional smoking, Meehan writes. Fayette Health Board Chairman Scott White, an attorney, noted that some e-cigarette flavors, such as bubble gum, target children. "If marketing a deadly product to children isn't evil, I don't know what is," he said. "We have enough history with the tobacco industry to know we need to get ahead of this."

Some think e-cigarettes can help people quit smoking, but that hasn't been proven. More research is still needed. Also, even if e-cigarettes help some people quit smoking, they may be a "gateway drug" to others.

The board may change "Lexington's current smoking ban to include e-cigarettes" and create "a public education campaign," Meehan reports. It's unclear how the board would do that, since the ban was passed by the Urban County Council. Also, the state Supreme Court recently ruled that health boards couldn't pass smoking bans, and it's unclear whether that decision would come into play.

Ellen Hahn, director of Kentucky Center for Smoke-Free Policy, told Meehan it would be best to "include electronic cigarettes in smoke-free laws because they are a tobacco product, and they pollute the air," Meehan writes. "E-cigarettes give off tiny particles that can lodge in the lungs and cause disease."

Though public health departments are helping reduce smoking rates in Kentucky, the "rates remain high, with about 29 percent of adults smoking and approximately 18 percent of people younger than 18," Meehan reports. "The state has also reported a leap in nicotine poisonings, and that leap has been tied to e-cigarettes." (Read more)