Tag: Lindsey Stroud

Numerical Response

Credit: Alexander Ovsyannikov
A large study conducted by the TPA shows e-cigarettes control youth smoking.
By Maria Verven
An extensive, state-by-state analysis conducted by the Taxpayers Protection Alliance (TPA) proves e-cigarettes are more effective in controlling youth smoking than tobacco control programs started after the Master Settlement Agreement (MSA).
“Tobacco & Vaping 101: 50 State Analysis,” authored by Lindsey Stroud, uses data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to argue the benefits of vaping, especially when it comes to teen usage. Ironically, this same data had been used to create public hysteria over vaping rates, especially among youth.
“As lawmakers across the country seek to reduce youth tobacco and vapor product use, many have introduced and passed legislation that regulates, taxes and in some cases prohibits the sale of products that actually help reduce tobacco use,” Stroud said.
Stroud said she’s been using the findings in state legislative testimony this year. “I’ve received positive feedback from pro-vaping and tobacco groups but have not heard much back from the anti-groups,” she said. “They may be surprised to see that I used the same data they do to argue the benefits of vaping,” she said, adding that she’s determined to make this information publicly available and accessible.
Stroud said she hopes other researchers and industry followers will use the report’s state-by-state information on adult and youth use of tobacco and vapor products in future articles and reports.
Of particular interest is the effectiveness—or lack thereof—of tobacco settlement payments, taxes and vapor products on reducing combustible cigarette use.
While all 50 states and Washington, D.C. saw a decrease in the percent of smokers, some states actually saw an increase in the number of smokers, due to an overall increase in the state’s population. Stroud’s analysis took into account both the percent difference and population change in examining adult and youth vapor and tobacco rates.
The analysis of cigarette tax revenues between 2000 and 2019 found that while cigarette tax hikes helped increase revenues in the short-term, these increases didn’t contribute to the decline in smoking rates.
It also shows that most states drastically underfunded programs for tobacco cessation services, education and prevention after collecting cigarette tax revenue and tobacco settlement monies over the past 19 years.
Vapor products tied to decrease in youth smoking
Of greatest importance is the analysis on the reduction in youth use of combustible cigarettes—which is at an all-time low. The report also examines youth vapor rates, specifying whether they ever tried an e-cigarette or are truly current or daily users.
Here’s where the data got really interesting. Stroud compared the smoking rates among 18-year-olds to 24-year-olds in the 10 years after the MSA with the smoking rates in the 10 years after e-cigarettes appeared on the market.
Credit: Vaksmanv
Lo and behold, there were greater decreases in smoking rates in the 10 years after the emergence of e-cigarettes when compared to the 10 years after tobacco settlement lawsuits.
And in the four states where smoking rates actually increased after e-cigarettes came on the market, policymakers had increased scrutiny and restrictions on e-cigarettes due to the perceived youth vaping “epidemic.” Coincidence? Stroud doesn’t think so.
“Addressing youth use of any age-restricted product is laudable, but it should not come at the expense of adult users of such products,” Stroud wrote in Politics, adding that bans, arduous regulations and/or unfair taxation threaten adult access to e-cigarettes and other tobacco harm reduction products.
“Completely disregarding that youth smoking rates are at all-time lows, officials often propose ‘solutions’ that fail to address the real reason why youth use e-cigarettes,” Stroud said.
States with higher rates of youth smoking have higher rates of youth vaping. Stroud said that the data clearly indicate that youth use e-cigarettes because friends and family members use them.
When asked about the “primary reason” for using e-cigarette products (among current users, only 10 percent of respondents from many states answered it was due to “flavors” while 17 percent cited “friends and family” and 51 percent cited “other.”
Vapor Voice caught up with Lindsey Stroud to learn more about this groundbreaking report and how this plethora of tobacco and vaping data can be used to inform future policymaking.
Vapor Voice: How was all this data collected? How long did it take?
Stroud: The idea was to provide policymakers with a plethora of tobacco-related data in a simplified manner.
We compiled the data manually by inputting data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Behavior Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) between 1995 and 2019.
While state-specific BRFSS data included detailed demographic information such as age, gender, race, education level, income and smoking status, it wasn’t easy finding that data for the U.S. as a whole. So I started going through individual state data and putting together state-specific spreadsheets on cigarette use.
In addition, I examined annual state cigarette tax receipts, annual state tobacco control funding, cigarette tax increases and youth tobacco and vapor product use, which came from the CDC’s Youth Risk Behavior Survey.
It’s important to note that the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids also uses this same BRFSS data. However, while Tobacco-Free Kids only shows smoking rates and the cost of smoking in each state, we pulled various data items to tell a more complete, insightful picture.
What surprised you the most about this project?
I was amazed that my hypothesis—that e-cigarettes were more effective than the MSA in reducing smoking rates among young adults—actually held true. It was really eye-opening.
It’s still pretty amazing that 45 states and D.C. saw greater decreases in smoking rates among 18[-year-old] to 24-year-old adults in the 10 years after e-cigarettes emerged on the market than in the 10 years after the tobacco companies started shelling out millions that states were supposed to use on smoking cessation programs.
In the outlier states, smoking rates were at their lowest levels ever until 2018—the same year the surgeon general declared a “youth vaping epidemic.” Tragically, that’s when smoking rates began to increase.
Why did you feel this data was needed?
I really wanted to show policymakers data that compared youth vaping to youth smoking rates, which were way higher in the 1990s, especially compared to today’s youth vaping rates.
In all states, cigarette tax increases led to immediate increases in revenue in the short term, but these have all fallen as less adults smoke cigarettes.
I also wanted to call attention to the lack of state funding for tobacco control programs, despite the fact that states receive millions if not billions of dollars annually from tobacco monies such as excise taxes and tobacco settlement payments.
As far as I know, this is one if not the first analysis of the BRFSS data to include graphs—which clearly show the reduction in smoking rates among young adults as well as how little funding is spent on tobacco control.
Finally, I wanted to prove my hypothesis that vaping can take much of the credit for the reduction in both adult and youth smoking rates.
The analysis can be found at: www.protectingtaxpayers.org/harm-reduction/tobacco-vaping-101-50-state-analysis/
The original “Vaping Vamp,” Maria Verven owns Verve Communications, a PR and marketing firm specializing in the vapor industry.

July 5, 2021
Stroud: UK Could Lead World in Tobacco Harm Reduction

If a nation’s public health policy succeeded in making its citizens healthier, wouldn’t you expect intergovernmental health organizations to examine that policy, embrace it, perhaps see if it could be applied to other countries?
Common sense, right?
Unfortunately, the taxpayer-funded World Health Organization (WHO) is doing the opposite when it comes to tobacco harm reduction products, states Lindsey Stroud, an analyst for the Taxpayer’s Protection Alliance (TPA), in an editorial for Inside Sources.
The United Kingdom is a world leader in e-cigarette use among current and former adult smokers. In 2015, Public Health England (PHE) released a landmark report that found e-cigarettes 95 percent safer than smoking. In 2018, the agency would reiterate this finding in an additional examination of the evidence.
Moreover, UK public health agencies actively campaign for the use of e-cigarettes as a substitute for smoking. PHE’s “Stoptober” campaign (launched in 2012) endorsed e-cigarettes and has advocated for “the use of e-cigarettes to help quit smoking.” The strategy appears to be working. In 2019, there were more than 4 million ex-smokers in the UK that had tried vapor products, with 2.2 million of them no longer smoking.
Now that the UK is no longer a member of the European Union, members of parliament have sought to redefine the country’s relationship with WHO. In particular, parliament is reviewing the provisions set forth in the organization’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC), of which the UK is a signatory member. Under the FCTC, members must adhere to a plethora of adopted guidelines including price and taxing measures to control – and ideally reduce – demand for tobacco products, as well as other policies to help protect public health and reduce cigarette consumption.
Unfortunately, the FCTC (and WHO) ignore the vast evidence regarding tobacco harm reduction products. Instead, they are steadfast in refusing to allow tobacco companies to provide safer alternatives to smoking.
Regularly, the members of the FCTC meet at a Convention of Parties (COP) to “review the implementation of the Convention and any other legal instruments that the COP adopts.” Since 2008, the organization has consistently pushed its members to “prohibit or restrict” smoking alternatives like vaping.
Lindsey Stroud
By 2019, any hope that the FCTC would even acknowledge the role of tobacco harm reduction products (including e-cigarettes, heated tobacco products, smokeless and snus) as a way for smokers to quit, was essentially snuffed out. In September 2019, Head Convention Secretariat Dr. Vera Luiza da Costa e Silva blasted e-cigarettes, calling vaping “a treacherous and flavored camouflage of a health disaster.”
But the UK may be preparing to push back. In a March 2021 report by the All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for Vaping, the group reported that at the upcoming FCTC/COP9, the UK is in a unique position to “champion its … domestic policies on tobacco harm reduction.” In prior COPs, the UK delegation was “obligated to adhere to the consensus view within the European Union, post-Brexit.” At FCTC/COP9, the delegation is permitted to defend their own domestic regulation of e-cigarettes and tobacco harm reduction products, but also emerge “on the world stage as a leader pragmatic and effective health regulation.”
The APPG for Vaping has denounced WHO’s position on tobacco harm reduction products. Their report notes two papers leaked from WHO’s Eastern Mediterranean Regional Office, which “suggest that the WHO is exploring whether to advocate that reduced-risk products are treated in the same manner as cigarettes or to ban them outright.” As a result, the APPG report recommends the UK delegation to COP9 should oppose “any decision proposed … that would equate vaping products with combustible cigarettes.”
It’s an utter shame the UK must still defend its tobacco control policies, as it was one of the very first countries to examine cigarette use and cancer incidence. In 1962, the Royal College of Physicians (RCP) published its landmark report on “Smoking and health” which “made a strong epidemiological case for the harm done by smoking,” and urged the government to introduce public health measures to reduce smoking.
By comparison, it would take two additional years for the United States to publish the 1964 Surgeon General’s report on smoking.
The RCP has also endorsed the use of e-cigarettes as a method to quit smoking, reporting in 2016 that the use of vapor products is “unlikely to exceed 5 percent of the risk of harm from smoking tobacco.”
The UK should not have to defend its tobacco harm reduction products to WHO, a taxpayer-funded organization that purports to protect global health, but staunchly disregards novel tobacco products. At the publication of the APPG for Vaping report, MP Mark Pawsey – and chair of the APPG Vaping group – declared that with “WHO taking an increasingly hostile stance on vaping, it is more important than ever that the UK be guided by the science.”
May 4, 2021
New Analysis of Vape Industry Covers All 50 U.S. States
The Taxpayers Protection Alliance (TPA) has released new data on the vaping industry for all 50 U.S. states. TPA analyst Lindsey Stroud says that the analysis includes state specific information on tobacco and vapor product use among adults and youth in all 50 states, as well as Washington D.C. Each state paper examines smoking rates among adults in the respective, youth use of tobacco and vapor products, and the effectiveness of tobacco settlement payments, taxes, and vapor products on reducing combustible cigarette use, according to the report.
Credit: Andy M
One section, Youth Tobacco and Vapor Rates, examines most state level youth vapor and tobacco rates, including identifying ever, current, and daily use. “It also provides an analysis on the reduction of youth combustible cigarette use among the years, which, as identified by this series, is at all time lows,” Stroud states in the report.
In another section, Vapor Product Emergence and Young Adult Smoking Rates, Stroud examines the efficacy of e-cigarettes as a smoking cessation tool and analyzed smoking rates among 18- to 24-year-old adults in the 10 years after suing tobacco companies and compares it to smoking rates in the 10 years after e-cigarettes’ market emergence, which is identified in the period between 2009 and 2012.
“In this 50-state analysis, as well as D.C., 46 states and the District of Columbia, saw greater decreases in smoking rates among young adults in the 10 years after e-cigarette market emergence, compared to the 10 years after tobacco settlement lawsuits,” Stroud states. “In the four outliers, smoking rates only increased among 18- to 24-year-old adults after policymakers increased scrutiny over e-cigarettes due to youth use.”
The TPA is a non-profit non-partisan organization dedicated to educating the public through the research, analysis and dissemination of information on the government’s effects on the economy, according to its website. The analysis concludes with a section on policy implications, graphs of young adult smoking rates and tobacco monies, and a list of references.
May 3, 2021
Stroud: Preventing Youth Use Should Rely on Data

By Lindsey Stroud
In 2018, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and then-Surgeon General Jerome Adams declared a so-called youth vaping epidemic. Lawmakers across the country, from city council members, to state leaders, to Congress, have been attempting to reduce youth use of e-cigarettes and vaping products ever since, Lindsey Stroud wrote for Inside Sources. Addressing youth use of any age-restricted product is laudable, but it should not come at the expense of adult users of such products. And all policies introduced by well-intended lawmakers threaten adult access either through bans, arduous regulations, or unfair taxation.
A quick glance at existing data on youth e-cigarette use finds many of these “solutions” fail to address the real reason why youth use e-cigarettes. Officials completely disregard that youth smoking rates are at all-time lows. Such legislation threatens adult access to tobacco harm reduction products and is unlikely to reduce youth e-cigarette use.
Take, for example, the impending ban on mailing vapor products. Crammed into the 5000+ pages of the December 2020 COVID-19 relief bill was an amendment to include electronic cigarettes in the Prevent All Cigarette Trafficking (PACT) Act. Not only will the new regulation ban the shipment of e-cigarettes in USPS mail it will also require retailers to register with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, as well require sellers, to submit monthly reports to the state agency that handles tobacco taxes in all states where their products are sold.
Lindsey Stroud

The amendment was introduced by Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), who erroneously claimed “[b]uying e-cigarettes online is one of the easiest ways for children and teens to get their hands on these harmful products.”
Several state-based youth surveys have shown youths are not relying on the internet to obtain e-cigarettes. For example, in 2019, in Vermont, among current e-cigarette users, only three percent of high school students under 18 years of age reported buying vapor products online. Conversely, 52 percent of minors reported borrowing e-cigarettes. In aggregate data of all students from five different state high school surveys including Arkansas, Maryland, Montana, New Hampshire, and Rhode Island, only 0.9 percent of high school students reported purchasing vapor products from online retailers. With very few youths using the internet and mail to obtain e-cigarettes, a ban on the shipment of such products is highly unlikely to reduce underage e-cigarette use.
The mail ban isn’t the only flawed “solution” proposed by lawmakers. Many localities and states have banned, or are attempting to ban, the sale of flavored vapor products. Yet again, the data overwhelmingly indicate youth use e-cigarettes because of “other” reasons and because friends and family members use them. For example, in the aforementioned Vermont survey, when asked about the “primary reason” for using e-cigarette products (among current users) only 10 percent reported “flavors,” compared to 51 percent who cited “other,” and 17 percent who cited friends and family. This data is similar to other states including Connecticut, Hawaii, Maryland, Montana, Rhode Island, and Virginia.
Again, banning flavors is unlikely to reduce youth use of e-cigarettes and it may also have adverse effects. In San Francisco, which banned the sale of flavored e-cigarettes in 2018, youth vaping still increased after the ban, but so did youth smoking rates. In fact, current combustible cigarette use among high school students increased from 4.7 percent of San Francisco high school students in 2017, to 6.5 percent in 2019.
In order to protect adult access, youth use of e-cigarettes and vapor products must be addressed, but bans are ineffective measures and ultimately punish adults. States do have one solution in place, borne by the pockets of the very smokers that are trying to quit by using flavor vapor products: the monies received from tobacco taxes and settlement payments.
Each year, states allocate a pitiful amount of existing tobacco dollars towards tobacco control measures, including cessation, education, and youth prevention. In 2019, states collected an estimated $16.7 billion in cigarette taxes and $6.2 billion in tobacco settlement payments, yet spent only $655 million in state funding on tobacco control programs. This is a paltry 3 percent.
Given the lack of funding dedicated towards programs to help smokers quit, policymakers should embrace e-cigarettes as they have been more effective at reducing smoking than the insufficiently-funded tobacco control programs.
As a tool that has helped millions of American adults quit smoking, lawmakers must avoid policies that preventing adult access to e-cigarettes and vapor products. They must also rely on existing data on why youth are using e-cigarettes when putting forth policies to limit youth e-cigarette use. To fail to do so harms millions of American adult smokers – and former smokers – and fails to reduce youth use.
Lindsey Stroud is the creator and manager of Tobacco Harm Reduction 101 (www.thr101.org), a website that provides analysis and insight on tobacco and vapor products.
March 23, 2021