Youth tobacco use has continued to decline based on a national survey, said the National Association of Tobacco Outlets (NATO). NATO said the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Federal Drug Administration (FDA) have collaborated to administer the National Youth Tobacco Survey (NYTS) to middle and high school students across the country since 2011.
The NYTS was designed to provide national data on tobacco-related behaviors, attitudes, beliefs and exposure to pro- and anti-tobacco influences. The findings of the 2022 NYTS were recently published in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR), said NATO. The 2022 data demonstrated that slightly more than one in 10 middle and high school students (3.08 million) had used a tobacco product during the past 30 days — including 16.5% of high school and
4.5% of middle school students.
For the 2022 NTYS, data was collected between January and May 2022 using an online survey among U.S. middle school students (6th-8th graders) and high school students (9th-12th graders). In total, 28,291 students (student participation rate is 76.1%) from 341 schools (school participation rate is 59.4%) participated in the 2022 NYTS, yielding an overall response rate of 45.2%.
The NYTS found that from 2020 to 2022 there was a decrease in tobacco use among both groups studied. The average decrease across all categories for high schoolers was –2.8% and for middle schoolers it was –2.0%.
NATO’s report stated for high school students, 16.5% reported use of any tobacco product. E-cigarettes were the product type most commonly used (14.1%), followed by cigars (2.8%), cigarettes (2.0%), smokeless tobacco (1.6%), hookahs (1.5%), nicotine pouches (1.4%) and pipe tobacco (0.7%). For middle school students, 4.5%, reported current use of any tobacco product. By product type, e-cigarettes were most commonly used (3.3%), followed by cigarettes (1.0%), smokeless tobacco (0.7%), cigars (0.6%), hookah tobacco and nicotine pouches (both 0.5%) and pipe tobacco (0.3%).