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The B.C. government is filing a civil claim against nicotine vape company Juul Labs, saying the company allegedly engaged in “deceptive marketing practices” and fuelled a youth addiction epidemic.
“Today, B.C. is once again stepping up,” B.C. Attorney General Niki Sharma said in a Dec. 12 statement. “We are filing a notice of civil claim in B.C. Supreme Court under the new Vaping Product Damages and Health Care Costs Recovery Act (VPRA) to hold JUUL Labs accountable for its public harms and to recover public health costs.”
The VPRA, which was introduced on Oct. 8 and came into force on Dec. 3, enables British Columbia to take legal action against companies that “cause public harm through misleading promotion of vaping products,” the province said in an Oct. 8 news release.
The legislation follows similar laws used by the province to sue tobacco and opioid companies for profiting while causing harm to the public.
E-cigarettes, also known as vapes or vapourizers, are battery-powered devices that heat up liquid in cartridges containing nicotine, turning it into a vapour. While the cartridges often contain nicotine, an addictive drug, they do not contain tobacco like traditional cigarettes do.
The province says Juul Labs developed “highly addictive” nicotine salts, and the product’s design and “youth-friendly” flavours caused many youth and non-smokers to become addicted to nicotine.
“JUUL was an early and significant contributor to vaping-related public harms, engaging in deceptive marketing practices aimed at youth to maximize its profits at the expense of people’s health and at significant cost to our public health system,” Sharma said, adding that the province is taking action to hold Juul Labs accountable for “its role in fuelling an epidemic of youth addition.”
She said the province is also considering litigation for other nicotine vape manufacturers and wholesalers for their role in the public health crisis. While the case with Juul Labs is the first civil claim launched, Sharma says “it will not be the last.”
“We will continue to use every tool available to hold bad actors responsible for the harms they created, and ensure accountability from those who put profits ahead of the well-being of British Columbians,” she added.
Juul’s Mission
Juul Labs says the company’s mission is to “transition the world’s billion adult smokers away from combustible cigarettes, eliminate their use, and combat underage usage of our products.”
“To that end, Juul does not want any non-nicotine users, especially those who are underage, to try our products,” the company says on its website.
The company also says it has taken “significant action to prevent underage use” of its products, noting that “appropriate access and marketing restrictions” can reduce underage use of vapor products.
A 2024 National Youth Tobacco Survey conducted by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention indicated that 5.9 percent of middle school and high school students reported using an e-cigarette within the last 30 days, while 0.7 percent reported using a Juul product within the last 30 days. Juul says this represented a 98 percent decrease in underage use of its products since 2019.
In July this year, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) cleared Juul Labs to continue selling its vaping device and nicotine cartridges, three years after it had moved to ban them.
The FDA said it had determined that evidence provided by the company demonstrated that five of its products met the legal standard for marketing new tobacco products in the United States. The FDA had originally banned all of Juul’s products in 2022 over what regulators described as insufficient evidence on toxicology.
Meanwhile, Yolonda Richardson, president and CEO of the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, said the FDA should “deny marketing applications for flavoured e-cigarettes and, along with other federal agencies, step up enforcement efforts against the many illegal products currently on the market.”
The Epoch Times reached out to Juul Labs for comment on the B.C. government’s civil claim but didn’t hear back before publication.
Juul Labs also says data show a need to “escalate enforcement against illicit disposable vape products that now dominate youth use.”
The B.C. Centre for Disease Control (CDC) says that vaping is “not without risk” and that the potential long-term effects “remain unknown.”
“For smokers, vaping is less harmful than cigarettes. Non-smokers, people who are pregnant, and young people should not vape,” the B.C. CDC says.
