Vaping in Children and the Crisis of Communicating Health Risks

JAKARTA - The phenomenon of children who know and even use vape is no longer a marginal story. In recent years, online media and conversations on social media have often featured surprising facts, elementary school children are familiar with e-cigarettes.

Vapes come with attractive designs, sweet aromas, and popular narratives as products that are "safer" than conventional cigarettes. This is where the problem begins when vaping is no longer seen as an individual behavior, but has evolved into a children's health crisis triggered by the failure to effectively convey health risks.

Medically, vape is not a harmless product. The World Health Organization (WHO) confirms that e-cigarettes still contain nicotine and various harmful substances that can cause addiction, respiratory disorders, and long-term health risks, especially in children and adolescents. WHO also reminds that e-cigarettes are marketed with various flavors and visual appearances that indirectly target young age groups, thus increasing the potential for exposure to nicotine early.

However, the main issue is not in the availability of health data, but in the inability to translate these risks into relevant and easy-to-understand public messages. Education about the dangers of vaping is still often delivered with a formal and normative approach, while the digital space is filled with content that presents vaping as a symbol of a modern lifestyle. Social media, influencers, and platform algorithms work much faster and persuasively than official health messages, so that the perception of "safe" is more dominant than fact-based warnings.

Health data in Indonesia shows that this problem is not just an assumption. The Ministry of Health of the Republic of Indonesia has recorded a trend of increasing use of e-cigarettes among young people, including school-age groups, even though the rate of conventional smoking tends to decrease. This phenomenon indicates a shift in behavior that is not balanced by the readiness of adequate prevention communication, both in the family environment and education.

In the perspective of reputation and crisis communication management, this condition reflects the failure of risk communication. Long-term, intangible risks are difficult for the public to understand when they are not conveyed through narratives that are close to their daily lives. This situation has a direct impact on the decline in public confidence in health, education, and regulatory institutions, which are considered not to be optimally present in protecting children from the normalization of vape use.

Social media then played a role as a driving force for the widespread crisis. Content about vape with attractive packaging reaches children faster than official health messages. Children learn from digital trends and public figures on social media, not from classrooms or health campaigns. A number of reports also noted the concerns of civil society about vape promotion by influencers who have the potential to reach children and adolescents, thus reinforcing the misconception that vape is a safe product.

In this situation, the health crisis is evolving into a communication crisis in the digital space, where public perceptions are formed much faster than fact-based clarifications. Unfortunately, the balancing messages from health and educational institutions are still sporadic and unsustainable. In fact, crisis communication requires the presence of consistent, empathetic, and child-protective messages, not just medical prohibitions or threats.

The vape crisis in children should be a warning that health communication can no longer be carried out with the old pattern. The government, schools, health workers, media, and parents need to build a collaborative and adaptive crisis communication strategy for the digital space. Social media should not only be seen as a source of problems, but also as a strategic channel to build health risk literacy early on.

In the end, protecting children from the threat of vaping is not only about regulation and enforcement, but about how risks are communicated and shared. When vaping has entered the world of children, it indicates a collective failure in conveying a meaningful health message. Without serious and sustained improvement in risk communication, this crisis will not only recur, but also leave a long-term impact on the quality of health of future generations.

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The author is Nanin Mahdalisa, a Master of Corporate Communication student at Paramadina University.