Survey: 10% of US students report current tobacco use

Key takeaways:

• One in 10 middle and high school students uses tobacco, although use has fallen among high schoolers, a survey found.
• E-cigarettes remain the most commonly used tobacco product in this population.

Survey responses analyzed by the CDC and FDA showed that 10% of middle and high school students in the United States reported currently using a tobacco product, although use fell among high schoolers over the past year.

The data were from this year’s edition of the National Youth Tobacco Survey, in which U.S. middle school students in grades 6 to 8 and high school students in grades 9 to 12 answered questions about tobacco products.

Although use of any tobacco product fell from an estimated 2.51 million students in 2022 to 1.97 million students this year, among more than 22,000 middle and high school students who responded to the survey, 10% reported using any tobacco product in the last 30 days prior to taking the survey.

Current use among high school students declined from 16.5% in 2022 to 12.6% in 2023, a finding primarily driven by a reported decline in e-cigarette use from 14.1% to 10% during the same period. Among students who reported current e-cigarette use, about one in four reported using e-cigarettes daily.

“The decline since 2022 in high school student e-cigarette use is likely attributable to multiple factors, such as ongoing efforts at the national, state, and local levels to implement tobacco control strategies, including Food and Drug Administration regulatory actions,” the authors wrote.

E-cigarettes were the most-used tobacco product among students in 2023, with 7.7% reporting use at some point. Most (89.4%) reported using flavored products such as Elf Bar, Esco Bars, Vuse, JUUL or Mr. Fog. Use of cigarettes (1.6%), cigars (1.6%), nicotine pouches (1.5%), smokeless tobacco (1.2%), other oral nicotine products (1.2%), hookahs (1.1%), heated tobacco products (1%) and pipe tobacco (0.5%) was less commonly reported.

The researchers emphasized that use of tobacco products, in any form, is unsafe, and that youth e-cigarette use remains a critical public health concern.

“Given the number of middle and high school students that use tobacco products, sustained efforts to prevent initiation of tobacco product use among young persons and strategies to help young tobacco users quit are critical to reducing U.S. youth tobacco product use,” they wrote.