San Jose City Councilmembers unanimously voted to ban electronic cigarettes and menthol cigarettes sales in a meeting Tuesday because of adverse health effects associated with the products’ use.
The enforcement plan will begin Oct. 1, 2021 and extend through July 1, 2022, where the city will gradually implement the regulations, according to the Proposed Ordinance Amendments.
Eleven community members urged voters to consider the ban during the meeting’s public forum.
The ordinance would give retailers a grace period until June 30, 2022 as established in the Retailer proximity ordinance. The retailer-to-retailer proximity license will affect 421 retailers within 500 feet of each other, and 421 retail stores 1,000 feet from schools, parks, libraries and recreational and youth centers.
The ordinance gives more than 650 tobacco San Jose retailers until June 30, 2022 before fines or legal action are imposed for selling the products, according to a Tuesday Mercury News article.
New tobacco retailers are also not permitted to open shops within 1,000 feet of schools and 500-feet from other tobacco shops.
Tim Gibbs, American Cancer Society’s senior director of government relations, said tobacco companies have been targeting the most vulnerable communities including low income and the youth for decades.
The American Cancer Society is a nationwide voluntary health organization, according to its website.
“These companies have spent millions of dollars fighting the restrictions of tobacco regulation in California,” Gibbs said. “I urge and support the memo passed by [District 9 Councilmember] Pam Foley and [her] colleagues, tobacco products should go off the shelves.”
When Foley initially proposed the ban in June she said the city needed to intervene because tobacco products are harming kids' health.
About one-in-three teens have tried e-cigarettes and one-in-eight use them, according to an Aug. 21, 2019 Santa Clara County Public Health Department survey.
Dr. John Maa, American Heart Association board member and San Francisco general surgeon, said tobacco products, e-cigarettes and vaping devices come in different colors and designs that entice young users to purchase them, according to a June 3 San Jose Spotlight article.
Vaping products have become relatively popular among college students in the last few years, according to a July 2019 University of Michigan study.
College students’ nicotine and marijuana use doubled between 2017 and 2018, according to the same study.
Nicole Coxe, Santa Clara County Public Health Department’s Tobacco-Free Community Program manager, said nicotine is a stimulant that negatively affects adolescents.
“Some of the effects that we have been seeing is that nicotine is a stimulant that affects the part of the brain in adolescents that controls attention spans,” Coxe said.
The Tobacco-Free Communities Program supports organizations in Santa Clara County and helps fund for populations who suffer disproportionately because of social conditions and aggressive tobacco industry marketing, according to the county’s public health website.
Coxe said Tobacco-Free Communities Program’s recent research shows a result of lung injuries and respiratory infections because of metals inside nicotine devices and the addictive nature of product’s flavors and chemicals.
She said the program is doing further research to understand the short-term and long-term effects of nicotine, and the county supports nicotine-addiction therapy.
“We do support the use of nicotine replacement therapies that are approved by the [Food and Drug Administration] and proven effective in aiding people quitting nicotine or tobacco use such as nicotine patches or gum,” Coxe said. “[The therapies] have gone through many clinical trials.”
San Jose State students say they continue to use vaping products despite the Santa Clara County health warnings and therapy proposals.
There are more than a dozen vape shops surrounding SJSU’s main campus including San Jose Vape and BullDog Smoke Shop and Gifts, both located near Yoshihiro Uchida Hall.
San Jose Vape and BullDog Smoke Shop and Gifts both declined to comment in regards to the recent ban and their sales to the SJSU community.
All University of California campuses banned vaping products in 2014 and SJSU implemented its own vaping ban in August 2015, according to an Aug. 22, 2015 Mercury News article.
Psychology senior Jesus Soriano said he sees mostly young students vaping on campus.
“As I walk on campus, I see signs that mention no vaping on campus or you’ll get cited,” Soriano said. “It's mostly younger students that I see vaping, which is even worse for them [because] vape pens contain tobacco just as cigarettes.”
Advertising senior Hudhayfah Masood said many students including himself vape on campus despite the university ban.
Masood said he started using e-cigarettes as a 13 year old in middle school. The vapes he started using were flavor based and the devices had disclaimers stating nicotine wasn’t an active chemical, which wasn’t true.
He said he didn’t see any harm in using these devices at the time and since then, has struggled to quit even though he wants to.
“I usually take a hit before a class presentation or whenever I am too stressed,” Masood said. “I try not to cause too much attention when I am at campus. I go to a quiet corner [on] the outskirts of campus and stay more than six-feet away from people.”
Masood said he doesn’t think Santa Clara County should consider vaping as “bad” as cigarettes.
“People can buy cigarettes at any corner store, they are acceptable,” Masood said. “It’s the same case with vape shops nearby campus.”
Communications sophomore Jasmine Sackey-Walker said she doesn't vape but she doesn’t oppose it either.
“I think everyone has a choice on how they want to treat their body,” Sackey-Walker said. “I personally do not believe vaping is healthy so I stay away from it.”
