On April 3, 2019, FDA commissioner Scott Gottlieb and Principal Deputy Commissioner Amy Abernethy released a statement in response to possible correlation between e-cigarettes and seizures.

It’s no secret that e-cigarettes contain more than the recommended amount, the most popular choice of vape among teens being the JUUL vape. The amount of nicotine in one JUUL pod is roughly the same as a pack of cigarettes, which is 20 cigarettes.

On average, each cigarette contains about 12mg of nicotine with the recommended amount being roughly 50-60mg of nicotine per day. This allows for roughly four or five cigarettes per day, but with teens they are consuming much more than this.

In one JUUL pod, there is over 240 mg of nicotine, more than four times what is recommended by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Although these statistics sound frightening, why should it matter what the CDC is saying?

Well, there is a reason the CDC only recommends up to 60mg of nicotine, and that is because anything over that amount can heavily damage brain development. It also can cause nicotine poisoning, an incident in where there is too much nicotine in the bloodstream.

This nicotine goes to the brain and in return can cause comas, seizures, brain damage, and sudden death. This information is directed towards adults, and their bodies can handle more than a teenagers body can. If this is happening to adults, what does this mean for teenagers?

While the FDA has yet to release another statement on the production of e-cigarettes, they will continue to run tests to find out just how much nicotine these teenagers are taking and how they can end the addictions.