Number Crunch

Juul Is Finally Paying the Price

The e-cigarette maker has hooked teens on nicotine and is now facing serious legal repercussions

$40 million: That’s how much e-cigarette maker Juul will pay North Carolina to settle a lawsuit due to the company’s deceptive marketing practices that has caused a new epidemic of addiction amongst the youth. The lawsuit is just one of many for Juul as states and localities throughout the country claim that introducing an alternative to combustible cigarettes didn’t solve a problem, but instead created a new one.

Cigarette smoking causes nearly half a million Americans each year to die. About one in five U.S. deaths are caused by cigarettes. Companies like Juul have sold the e-cigarette as a safe alternative to smoking cigarettes. There is no definitive research proving that e-cigarettes aren’t a safer alternative to traditional cigarettes, but vaping’s impact on lung health remains less clear.

Truth Initiative, an organization focused on informing people on the dangers of smoking, vaping, and nicotine, said e-cigarette users are five times more likely to test positive for Covid-19 due to compromised lung health.

What North Carolina and other states are more concerned with, however, is the company’s…