Eliza Gray

Tobacco smoking among teens is down nationwide

Fewer teens in the United States are smoking regular cigarettes, according to the results of a federally funded survey released Tuesday, but the popularity of electronic cigarettes suggests that some teens may be choosing e-cigs over traditional smokes.

Daily smoking among teenagers in the 8th, 10th, and 12th grades has been cut almost in half in the last five years, according to data from the annual “Monitoring the Future Survey.” Gathered from more than 40,000 kids in 377 public and private schools nationwide by researchers at the University of Michigan, the data also shows that more than one in six high school seniors, and almost as many sophomores, used electronic cigarettes in the last month.

MORE: E-cigs Are the New Cool Thing for Teenagers

“It is very possible that [electronic cigarettes] could account for some of the decrease in tobacco smoking — that kids that would otherwise start with tobacco cigarettes start by vaping,” said Dr. Nora Volkow, the director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse. “We are facing a completely new pattern of administering drugs.”

The data offers one possible explanation for why high schoolers are so willing to use electronic cigarettes: They think they’re safer. Just over 50% of 10th graders surveyed believed that smoking between one and five cigarettes a day posed a great risk, while only 14% thought the same thing about regular e-cig use.

While some kids may prefer the electronic alternatives, it’s also clear that many kids like to use both, just like adults who use tobacco. Of the high school seniors who said they’d used e-cigs in the last month, more than 40% said they had also smoked a conventional cigarette in the last month, too.

MORE: The Future of Smoking

While we wait for sorely needed regulation from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), “there needs to be a massive educational campaign to dispel the hype and outright deception from the industry,” says Sen. Richard Blumenthal, (D-Conn.), who as Connecticut’s Attorney General fought to stop deceptive tobacco marketing to children.

“The industry is saying to teenagers that e-cigarettes are healthy and cool, that there is nothing in the vapor that could possibly harm you, and that they are a healthy alternative to cigarettes for people who want to quit,” he adds. “But in fact they may be a very unhealthy gateway to cigarette smoking for people who don’t use tobacco products now.”

Electronic cigarettes are such new products that research is inconclusive about their safety and whether they will act as a gateway to smoking for teens. Though the FDA has proposed plans to begin regulating them, the hundreds of e-cig offerings on the market are currently unchecked, leaving a wide range of safety implications depending on the product.

Focus on campuses obscures young women not in school

There’s a new wrinkle to the ongoing debate about campus sexual assault: Non-students are actually more likely than students to be victimized, according to new federal data.

The finding, in a Justice Department report released Thursday, comes amid a fierce focus over the last several months on campus sexual assault and the federal government’s efforts to address it. This new data indicates that just as much—if not more—needs to be done to protect young college-aged women who aren’t in school. College-aged women, whether or not they are in school are more likely to be victims of rape and sexual assault than other age groups.

“I think the data shows that all the attention to college rape over the last year has been appropriate because it’s a problem there, but it has been too narrow a focus because we want to make sure we are not leaving out the huge number of people who don’t go to college,” says Scott Berkowitz, president of Rape Abuse & Incest National Network.

MORE: The sexual assault crisis on American campuses

For the period of 1995 to 2013, non-students aged 18-24 were 1.2 times more likely to be victims of sexual assault than their student counterparts, according to the report.

The report contained other interesting findings about the similarities and differences between these two groups of victims. Students and non-students were equally likely to know their attacker (80% in both cases), but non-students were more likely to report it to the police. Eighty percent of student rapes and sexual assaults went unreported to the police compared to 67% for non-students. The finding is particularly interesting because of the debate raging among advocates, public officials and administrators over how best to involve police in campus assault.

“Much of the reform attention has been on the college judicial process,” adds Berkowitz, “but this data really points out that we cannot focus on that at expense criminal justice system, because that would mean abandoning the great many victims who never attend college.”

Popularity of a new tobacco product raises health concerns

It looks like vaping has a bright future in Hawaii.

Experimentation with electronic cigarettes among Hawaii’s high school and middle school students more than tripled from 2011-2013, according to a new state survey. Almost 8% of middle school students and 18% of high school students had tried electronic cigarettes in 2013 (up from 2% and 5%, respectively, in 2011), according to the survey of public school students by the Hawaii State Department of Health. It’s illegal in Hawaii to sell electronic cigarettes to children under the age of 18.

The latest federal data in 2012 showed that 10% teens have tried electronic cigarettes nationwide. New federal numbers on national teen use of electronic cigarettes will come out next week.

MORE: The future of smoking

Smoking of traditional cigarettes among high school students in Hawaii dropped from 2011-2013 and remained steady for Hawaii’s middle schoolers, according to the survey.

The health effects of electronic cigarettes are not well understood. Many in the health community fear that the rise in youth exposure to electronic cigarettes could re-glamorize smoking and become a gateway to traditional cigarettes. Electronic cigarette manufacturers have come under fire from Congress for marketing practices and flavors that seem geared at teens. The federal government has yet to regulate electronic cigarettes.

MORE: Electronic cigarette executives get schooled in Senate hearing

The reason for optimism amid more reports of military sexual assault

It could be easy to get discouraged reading about the Pentagon survey Thursday that found reports of sexual assault in the American military are on the rise. But a closer look at the numbers gives reason for optimism: There are more reports of assault because more women are reporting those assaults rather than staying silent.

“This is a remarkable change in terms of victims being willing to talk to people in the military about what happened to them,” Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.), one of the key advocates of military sexual assault reform in Washington, said Thursday afternoon at a news conference with fellow lawmakers.

Reported assaults hit 5,983 in the 2014 fiscal year that ended Sept. 30, up 8% from last year and up from 3,604 in 2012. But the proportion of service members who said they were assaulted decreased by roughly 27%. Among those who were assaulted, one in four reported it, a sharp increase from one in 10 in 2012.

MORE: The sexual assault crisis on America’s campuses

Sexual assault is one of the most underreported crimes in the U.S. because of the stigma survivors face. Raising the rates of reporting, therefore, is a key goal as reformers look to hold perpetrators accountable and reduce the number of assaults. That was true for Congress when it passed a number of reforms to the military’s handling of sexual assault over the last several months. And the rise in reports, along with promising responses from victims about being satisfied by the way their cases were handled, indicates a shift in culture that is moving in the right direction.

The military isn’t the only institution that has seen an increased culture of reporting: higher education is moving in this direction, too. Earlier this year, a government report showed that the number of sex crimes reported by colleges themselves rose 52 percent between 2001 and 2011, with a particularly sharp rise in 2010 and 2011.

MORE: Here’s the real reason college sex reports are rising

The military report was not all good news. Reports of retaliation remained high, especially among peers, raising questions about how much better the broader culture in the military really is.

But at a moment when awareness of violence against women has hit a high water mark after highly publicized incidents on campuses, in the military, in professional sports and in Hollywood, Thursday’s news holds out promise that victims will continue to feel more empowered to come out of the shadows across the country.

Why Naloxone prices are spiking 50% or more

The heroin overdose “miracle drug” is getting more expensive again.

Police departments are seeing a spike in the cost of Naloxone, the New York Times reports, with prices jumping by 50% or more. In Georgia, police saw kits with the drug go from $22 to $40.

Naloxone has always been subject to dramatic fluctuations in price and availability, restricting access for cash-strapped community organizations who distribute the drug across the U.S. The reasons for the volatility have always been complex and frustratingly opaque. But it may be from lack of competition: Only two companies, Amphastar, which makes a nasal spray, and Hospira, which makes an injectable, manufacture the drug.

MORE: This drug can stop an overdose so why is it so hard to get?

But demand for the drug is also going up: The latest price hike coincides with the proliferation of its distribution through police forces and community health programs. New policies across the country have put the Naloxone nasal spray into the hands of police officers to administer it to people overdosing. Recently passed laws in states like Pennsylvania and North Carolina also made it possible for doctors to prescribe the drug to friends and family of those addicted to heroin and prescription painkillers. Speaking to the Times, the president of Amphastar cited rising annual manufacturing costs for the increase.

Drug overdose has steadily risen to become the leading cause of injury death in the U.S., eclipsing automobile accidents, according to government data. Getting Naloxone into the hands of more first responders has been a priority for the Obama Administration in addressing what Attorney General Eric Holder has called “an urgent public health crisis.”

MORE: Heroin’s resurgence