New York Sues 13 Vape Manufacturers
ProCon Debate: Is Vaping Safer than Smoking Cigarettes?
ProCon Issue in the News: Thirteen vape manufacturers are being sued by New York state, where selling flavored vapes has been both illegal and ubiquitous since 2020.
Manufacturers of such vape brands as Puff Bar, Elf Bar (sold as EBCreate in the United States), Geek Bar, Breeze, and MYLÉ sell flavored vapes with brightly colored packaging in a variety of candy flavors, including Baja Slushie, OMG Blow Pop, Cotton Candy, Blue Razz Slushy, Sour Watermelon Patch, Unicorn Cake, Fruity Bears Freeze, Rainbow Rapper, Sour Fruity Worms, Fruity Pebbles, and Strawberry Cereal Donut Milk. To many people, such marketing seems intentionally designed to hook kids and teens on vaping.
New York Attorney General Leticia James filed suit against 13 vape manufacturers, alleging that they created a “youth vaping epidemic” by advertising these products on social media and selling them near schools. The products listed in the lawsuit are not approved by the FDA. James is seeking “hundreds of millions of dollars” in compensation.
According to James,
The vaping industry is taking a page out of Big Tobacco’s playbook: they’re making nicotine seem cool, getting kids hooked, and creating a massive public health crisis in the process. For too long, these companies have disregarded our laws in order to profit off of our young people, but we will not risk the health and safety of our kids. Today, we are taking critical steps toward holding these companies accountable for the harm they have caused New Yorkers.
Vape manufacturers and others insist that vaping is a safe alternative to smoking cigarettes and that the industry is being unfairly targeted. Allison Boughner, the vice president of the trade group American Vapor Manufacturers, maintained that vapes were “innovative quitting tools.” In fact, news of the lawsuit followed an opinion piece in The New York Times defending vaping, in which the author, Maia Szalavitz, argued,
What Americans really need is access to safer [nicotine] products. Controversially, this will require [the FDA] approving more vapes and oral nicotine products, and [require] making them more affordable than cigarettes via sales taxes. It will also mean aggressively communicating to the public that what kills smokers is primarily smoking itself, not nicotine.
Discussion Questions
- Is vaping safer than smoking cigarettes? Read ProCon’s vaping debate and then explain your answer.
- Should vaping companies be punished for advertising to kids and teens? Why or why not?
- Is vaping a good way to stop smoking cigarettes? Explain your answer.
Sources
- Leticia James, “Attorney General James Sues Nation’s Largest Vape Distributors for Fueling the Youth Vaping Epidemic” (February 20, 2025), ag.ny.gov
- Alyce McFadden, “New York Sues Vape Makers, Saying They Make Products Attractive to Teens” (February 20, 2025), nytimes.com
- Maia Szalavitz, “The Hard Truth About Nicotine” (February 14, 2025), nytimes.com