• TUPE: Tobacco Use Prevention Education Program

    The purpose of the TUPE program is to reduce youth tobacco use by helping young people make healthful tobacco-related decisions through tobacco-specific educational instruction and activities that build knowledge as well as social skills and youth development assets.

    While the primary focus of the program is tobacco prevention, including e-cigarettes/vape pens, our strategies are comprehensive and include information on alcohol, marijuana, and other drugs. Students are also building a wide variety of important and relevant skills including communication, planning, public speaking, and decision making.

    Youth and Tobacco Use

    Youth use of tobacco products in any form is unsafe.

    According to CDC, if cigarette smoking continues at the current rate among youth in this country, 5.6 million of today’s Americans younger than 18 will die early from a smoking-related illness. That’s about 1 of every 13 Americans aged 17 years or younger who are alive today.

    Background


    Preventing tobacco product use among youth is critical to ending the tobacco epidemic in the United States.

      • Tobacco product use is started and established primarily during adolescence.
      • Nearly 9 out of 10 adults who smoke cigarettes daily first try smoking by age 18, and 99% first try smoking by age 26.
        • Each day in the U.S., about 1,600 youth smoke their first cigarette and nearly 200 youth start smoking every day.
      • Flavorings in tobacco products can make them more appealing to youth.
        • In 2020, 85% of high school students and 74% of middle school students who used tobacco products in the past 30 days reported using a flavored tobacco product during that time.


    Estimates of Current Tobacco Use Among Youth

      • During 2019-2020, current use of any tobacco product, any combustible tobacco product, multiple tobacco products, e-cigarettes, cigars, and smokeless tobacco among middle and high school students decreased.
        • These declines resulted in an estimated 1.73 million fewer current youth tobacco product users in 2020 (4.47 million) compared to 2019 (6.20 million).
     

    Electronic cigarettes (E-cigarettes)

      • E-cigarettes have been the most commonly used tobacco product among youth since 2014.
      • After increasing between 2017 and 2019, current (past 30 day) use of e-cigarettes went down among middle and high school students from 2019 to 2020.6,7,8,9
        • About 1 of every 20 middle school students (4.7%) reported in 2020 that they used e-cigarettes in the past 30 days—a decrease from 10.5% in 2019.6,9,10
        • About 1 of every 5 high school students (19.6%) reported in 2020 that they used electronic cigarettes in the past 30 days—a decrease from 27.5% in 2019.6,10


    Cigarettes

      • From 2011 to 2020, current (past 30 day) cigarette smoking went down among middle and high school students.
        • Nearly 2 of every 100 middle school students (1.6%) reported in 2020 that they smoked cigarettes in the past 30 days—a decrease from 4.3% in 2011.
        • Nearly 5 of every 100 high school students (4.6%) reported in 2020 that they smoked cigarettes in the past 30 days—a decrease from 15.8% in 2011.


    Cigars

      • From 2011 to 2020, current use of cigars went down among middle school students and high school students.
        • Nearly 2 of every 100 middle school students (1.5%) reported in 2020 that they had used cigars in the past 30 days—a decrease from 3.5% in 2011
        • About 5 of every 100 high school students (5.0%) reported in 2020 that they had used cigars in the past 30 days—a decrease from 11.6% in 2011.


    Smokeless Tobacco

      • From 2011 to 2020, current use of smokeless tobacco went down among middle and high school students:
        • About 1 of every 100 middle school students (1.2%) reported in 2020 that they had used smokeless tobacco in the past 30 days—a decrease from 2.2% in 2011.
        • About 3 of every 100 high school students (3.1%) reported in 2019 that they had used smokeless tobacco in the past 30 days—a decrease from 7.9% in 2011.


    Hookah

      • From 2011 to 2020, current use of hookahs did not change much among middle schools students. Current use of hookahs among high school students declined from 2011 to 2019, then saw no change from 2019 to 2020.6,7,9,10
        • About 1 of every 100 middle school students (1.3%) reported in 2020 that they had smoked hookah in the past 30 days. The prevalence was 1.0% in 2011.
        • Nearly 3 of every 100 high school students (2.7%) reported in 2020 that they had smoked hookah in the past 30 days. The prevalence was 4.1% in 2011.


    Heated Tobacco Products

      • In 2020, about 1 of every 100 middle school students (1.3%) and about 1 of every 100 high school students (1.4%) reported using heated tobacco products in the past 30 days.
      • Heated tobacco products, also known as “heat-not-burn” products, deliver nicotine to the user by heating tobacco leaves rather than a nicotine-containing liquid like e-cigarettes do.
     


    All Tobacco Product Use

      • In 2020, nearly 7 of every 100 middle school students (6.7%) and about 23 of every 100 high school students (23.6%) reported current use of a tobacco product.
      • In 2019, nearly 1 of every 4 middle school students (24.3%) and over half (53.3%) of high school students said they had ever tried a tobacco product.


    Many young people use two or more tobacco products.

      • In 2020, Nearly 3 of every 100 middle school students (2.8%) and about 8 of every 100 high school students (8.2%) reported current use of two or more tobacco products in the past 30 days.6,10
      • In 2019, about 12 of every 100 middle school students (11.5%) and about 30 of every 100 high school students (29.9%) said they had ever tried two or more tobacco products.
      • Youth who use multiple tobacco products are at higher risk for developing nicotine dependence and might be more likely to continue using tobacco into adulthood.