Vaping has become one of the most dangerous trends. More and more teens have been hospitalized because of this and have developed permanent lung diseases. There have been around 1,299 confirmed vape related illnesses across the United States. 80% of the people who have fallen sick are under 35 years old. So why haven’t these facts scared teens into stopping? The reason why is probably because they have become addicted.

A brain fully develops when a person is around 25, and a teen’s brain is only partially developed; therefore, they cant fully make reasonable choices. That is a huge reason why most start vaping so young. When parts of the brain have not fully matured, teens are incredibly susceptible to not thinking ahead or not thinking of future consequences. Then once a teen makes vaping a habit then he or she would slowly become addicted. Once he or she becomes addicted then it turns the physiological dependence. Now it becomes extremely hard to turn away from vaping because their body has gotten used to frequent intakes of nicotine.

Most people think that vapes contain relatively safe ingredients but that is far from the truth. Even though vapes do not contain pure tobacco, tar, or carbon monoxide, it can still damage your body. There are 4 substances in a vape: water, nicotine, flavoring, and a propylene glycol or a vegetable glycerin base. It is known that nicotine is a very destructive substance but most don’t know exactly what is does and what it affects. When you take any sort of nicotine it raises your adrenaline levels, witch causes your heart rate, blood pressure, and breathing to increase. When the nicotine proceeds to the brain it increases dopamine; therefore, making it more addictive because the brain recognizes it as pleasurable. The dopamine is one of the main reasons why nicotine is so addictive, and can lead to a lifetime of struggles.

The flavoring in the Juul is also extremely harmful. A lot of the flavoring can contain harmful ingredients that cause cells harm. For example, a lot of the flavors can cause popcorn lungs. The chemical that causes this is: diacetyl. The diacetyl has been removed from some of the companies flavoring, but not many. This chemical scars the tiny air sacs, therefore makes it harder to breathe. This side effects include: a dry cough, wheezing, headache, fever, shortness of breath, and more. If this continues to get worse your airways could close in on themselves. Besides the nicotine the flavoring can be one of the most harmful substances.

In conclusion, because teens are so susceptible to peer pressure, they are more likely to start an addiction. This addiction can lead to a life time of problems and bad habits. Vaping has become a huge problem in our current society and we need to do something to stop it. There should not be people dying from this, especially teens.