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E-cigarette usage declined among kids, as did cigarette and cigar smoking, and hookahs, according to the CDC’s annual National Youth Tobacco Survey. In fact, overall tobacco use saw a marked drop from the 2023 poll, with an estimated 2.25 million students having consumed a tobacco product in the past 30 days, compared to 2.8 million students the year before. But one product saw an increase in usage: nicotine pouches.

Unlike cigarettes, cigars, or pipes, nicotine pouches don’t contain any actual tobacco leaves, though the nicotine they contain can be derived from tobacco plants. Even so, for the purpose of the survey, the CDC still classifies them as a tobacco product. Nicotine pouches are composed of a powder made up of nicotine (which by itself is extremely addictive and dangerous) and flavorings. Users insert them between their gums and lips, and the nicotine is absorbed through the gums and mouth lining as the powder dissolves, according to the CDC.

The pouches have become something of a culture war issue over the past few years, with conservative heavy hitters, including congresspeople Mike Collins and Marjorie Taylor Green, adopting them as an anti-regulation cause célèbre. Though they’ve been on the market for decades, their popularity has exploded over the past decade. One study found sales of the product increased over 300% between 2016 and 2020, while tobacco company Phillip Morris, which owns the popular Zyn brand, reported a 78% increase in sales of the pouches in the fourth quarter of 2023.

Tucker Carlson even told comedian/podcaster/walking haircut nightmare Theo Von that he believed the pouches enhanced his acumen in the boudoir. If you need a scare before Halloween, just try picturing that. Horrifying. It should also be noted that this claim is almost definitely false. Study after study has found a link between tobacco use and erectile dysfunction, including e-cigarettes. Even without a delivery mechanism that involves tobacco, nicotine constricts blood vessels, which can contribute to sexual dysfunction.

Now, we know that the trend has reached young people. In 2023, the pouches were the fourth most popular tobacco product among the middle and high school students, behind vapes, cigarettes, and cigars. This year, they’ve moved into second place, with 1.4% of replying students saying they had used them in the past 30 days, up from 1.2% the previous year. Vapes remain, by far, the most popular product, but their usage declined from 7.7% to 5.9%. Cigarettes came in third (hitting the lowest rate ever recorded by the survey, which the CDC has conducted since 1999), followed by cigars.

Experimenting with tobacco now seems less likely to lead to a habit. In this year’s survey, 42.9% of students who had ever used a tobacco product said they had done so in the past month, down from 46.7% the previous year.“We’re headed in the right direction when it comes to reducing tobacco product use among our nation’s youth,” said Brian King, director of the FDA’s Center for Tobacco Products, in a statement. “But we can’t take our foot off the gas. Continued vigilance is needed to continue to reduce all forms of tobacco product use among youth. Addressing disparities remains an essential part of these efforts to ensure that we don’t leave anyone behind.”

Each year, the CDC conducts the National Youth Tobacco Survey through an online questionnaire, which middle and high school students (grades six through 12) voluntarily fill out on a self-administered basis. For the 2024 survey, data was collected on May 22, with 29,861 students taking part.

You should all know this by now, but nicotine use is tied to a wide variety of health problems (on top of ED), including hardening of artery walls, threats to pregnancy, and even affecting brain development in people under 25. Just as a general rule, if Tucker Carlson likes something, it probably produces human misery, and that’s a lesson we should be teaching our kids.

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Kids are smoking less, but the popularity of nicotine pouches has made its way to the youth, according to CDC data. © Swenico.com via Flickr

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