Mango Madness: The Electronic Vaping Epidemic

Vapes create unpredictable variables as gateway drugs, opening the door for the trial of other social drugs.

Sandford+Zeng+20

Sandford Zeng ’20

While browsing and scrolling through social media apps such as Snapchat, “Who got pods?” is an all-too-familiar colloquialism found among high school students’ vocabulary.

This phrase, often used by teenage addicts of refillable electronic vaporizers, better known as vape devices, is meant to attract attention to local pod dealers who can sell them to these young addicts for inflated prices.

However, “who got pods?” is not simply a request for a fresh, new pack of mango-flavored pods; it is a serious cry for help. Teenagers, who are able to purchase vape devices including brand names such as JUUL and FLAIR on a whim, are slowly adulterating their lives through the usage of vaping devices, and it is up to federal agencies like the FDA to regulate and strictly impose greater restrictions on the illegal sale of vapes to America’s youth.

Enforcement upon the youth vaping epidemic is imperative because it may pose significant health risks, present dangerous social consequences, and tear the moral fabric of a whole generation.


Vape devices, originally marketed towards older cigarette smokers aiming to reduce or quit their toxic habit, have found themselves in the hands of high school students. Disposable refills, also known as pods, for these devices are filled with nicotine, which is intended to wean smokers off “cancer sticks” and onto a safer alternative.

However, in the eyes of a teenager, there is no alternative; JUUL is the first choice. These chemical-laden pods cause many short term side effects, including a temporary “buzz” similar to that of a cigarette high, coughing, and nausea. The addictive substance nicotine reshapes the young brain to crave more of the drug, in larger and larger amounts.

We have all heard this fact before, usually regarding the use of cigarettes. What makes the vape so much different from the killers of American legends like Nat “King” Cole and Babe Ruth? Being a relatively new technology, the long-term effects of vaping is not widely studied.

However, while walking along the track the other day during P.E. class, I overheard another student fearing for their lungs in the future, sarcastically remarking, “Even if I quit right now, my lungs are gonna be so shot when I’m 40.” Vapes also create unpredictable variables as gateway drugs, opening the door for the trial of other social drugs.

The adversity is unknown, and if 26 percent of American high school students are the guinea pigs, nearly a fourth of our generation may possibly face the dangers of lung cancer and other smoking-related diseases.


Much like any other drug, especially those popular among the youth, such as alcohol and marijuana, vape devices can deteriorate the social and academic lives of its users. Despite its clear popularity among high school students, ideals and the psychological concept of group polarization divide teens into two camps: the vapers and the non-vapers.

Although many are indifferent about the issue, vapers face a negative stigma associated with “druggies” and people of low-moral standards and intelligence, as shown by the CDC reports on a strong correlation between the percentage of high schoolers who vape and low academic grades. Much like Richard Nixon’s concept of a “silent majority,” contextually the non-verbally active majority of Americans who supported the Vietnam War, most American teenagers oppose the use of JUUL and similar companies’ products.


There are few who will not admit that drugs and illegal substances have unfavorable, morally deteriorating effect on the impressionable youth. In my own experience, there is one person I know who is in constant conflict with his parents and spends half of his grocery store paycheck on pods and marijuana.

This person, someone who used to have a great sense of moral integrity, someone I used to share a close bond with, spends a majority of time attempting, but failing, to hide his sad lifestyle from his father. Between the parents and the vaper, hidden and used-up pods and JUULs hidden in socks shatter the sense of privacy and trust within the family. The honest resolve of America’s youth is fading away behind a cloud of fruit-flavored smoke and vapor.


Vape users and proponents of e-cigarettes often defend their usage by claiming that without their trusty vape devices, they would probably be smoking cigarettes, or something much worse. There is a degree of truth to this claim; however, I am not seeking the ban of these products, merely stricter regulation which eliminates nicotine from students’ lives.

It is embarrassing to see these small, USB shape devices compromising the futures of high schoolers around the country. Therefore, to preserve honor and possibility lives, vaping among teens must go.


It is not the responsibility of the FDA to simply impose consequences on companies such as JUUL and FLAIR. In essence, their intentions are pure, as a solution for recovering smokers. Rather, the FDA should cut the issue at the roots of the weed, creating and enforcing tougher laws to keep vaping devices out of teenage hands.

The lives of the American youth are far too valuable to be using a pod a day, which is equivalent to a pack of cigarettes. What is life without addiction and pods? It is a life of improved lung function, not coughing every time one picks up a speed faster than a walking pace. It is a life of social freedom, unbound from the negative stigmas of vaping.

It is a life of moral strength, uncorrupted by thoughts of nicotine.