{"doi":"10.1101/2023.05.19.23290249","title":"The impact of flavored e-cigarette bans on e-cigarette use in three US states","abstract":"Abstract Introduction Beginning in 2019, several U.S. states implemented temporary or permanent bans on the sale of flavored e-cigarettes. This study examined the impact of flavor bans on adult e-cigarette use in Washington, New Jersey, and New York. Methods Adults who used e-cigarettes at least once a week before the flavor bans were recruited online. Respondents reported their e-cigarette use, primarily used flavor, and ways of obtaining ecigarettes before and after the bans. Descriptive statistics and multinomial logistic regression models were applied. Results After the ban, 8.1% of respondents (N=1624) quit using e-cigarettes, those primarily used banned menthol or other flavors declined from 74.4% to 50.8, those using tobacco-flavored declined from 20.1% to 15.6%, and those using non-flavored increased from 5.4% to 25.4%. More frequent e-cigarette use and smoking cigarettes were associated with being less likely to quit e-cigarettes and more likely to use banned flavors. Of those primarily using banned flavors, 45.1% obtained e-cigarettes from in-state stores, 31.2% from out-of-state stores, 32% from friends, family, or others, 25.5% from Internet/mail sellers, 5.2% from illegal sellers, 4.2% mixed flavored e-liquids themselves, and 6.9% stocked up on e-cigarettes before the ban. Conclusions Most respondents continued to use e-cigarettes with banned flavors post-ban. Compliance of local retailers with the ban was not high, and many respondents obtained banned-flavor e-cigarettes through legal channels. However, the significant increase in the use of non-flavored e-cigarettes post-ban suggests that these may serve as a viable alternative among those who used previously used banned or tobacco flavors. Implications This study examined the impact on adult e-cigarette users from the recent e-cigarette-only flavor bans in Washington State, New Jersey, and New York. We found that most respondents continued to use e-cigarettes with banned flavors post-ban and obtain banned-flavor e-cigarettes through legal channels. Our findings indicate that non-flavored e-cigarettes may serve as an acceptable alternative to both non-tobacco and tobacco-flavored e-cigarettes and state e-cigarette flavor bans are unlikely to prompt a significant number of adult e-cigarette users to replace their e-cigarette use with new or increased smoking. Enforcing compliance of retailers to the policy is crucial to control e-cigarette use.","journal":"medRxiv","year":2023,"id":390255,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":12,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9501,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2023-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":276925,"name":"Eric N. Lindblom","orcid":"0000-0003-0627-0987","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":276927,"name":"Kenneth D. Ward","orcid":"0000-0001-8972-538X","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":276926,"name":"Ramzi G. Salloum","orcid":"0000-0002-8139-2418","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":276924,"name":"Yong Yang","orcid":"0000-0003-0009-0010","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":26,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-19T01:18:32.854511Z","pmid":"37292701","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}