Putnam County Sheriff Eddie Farris said a series of recent overdose scares among high school students shows the the biggest danger with vapes is the unknown contents within them.
Farris said most vapes are made in unknown factories, primarily in China. That’s why, Farris said, what looks to be just a regular convenience store vape can be deadly.
“A lot of the things and the products that are in these vapes are just simply unknown,” Farris said. “Yes, it may very well have some THC in the vape, but you know, what’s the quality and what else is along within there with it, so it’s just very difficult to tell.”
An Upperman High School student had to be airlifted to Vanderbilt after using what he thought was a THC vape. Farris said the sheriff’s office has confiscated 44 THC vapes out of the high schools and four out of the middle schools.
Some 65 nicotine vapes have been taken by Sheriffs Department officials out of the high schools, 32 out of the middle schools, and four out of the elementary schools. Farris said the law in Tennessee is that you have to be 21 years old in order to purchase a vape, and somehow, kids are getting possession of them.
“We have some state legislation that’s in the works right now to try to regulate who actually sells THC vaping,” Farris said. “So they can be monitored, so they can be examined, and making sure everybody is playing by the same rules as far as where they are purchasing it from, is it a quality company, we can track where the vape comes from, and so on and so forth. I think it’s going to be suggested that it’s regulated by the Alcoholic Beverage Commission (ABC).”
Farris said most vapes contain nicotine or THC, which can kill brain cells. Farris said a recent study showed that people who vape are 200 percent more likely to develop cancer. Farris said the sheriff’s office is hoping to get a handle on vapes as vaping has become popular amongst the youth in Putnam County.
“We have had students even in the past that have been THC vaping that have passed out, and when they pass out, they fall and hit their head, depends on what they are doing,” Farris said. “Hopefully, they are not driving, but you know, it can affect different people in many different ways, so it is something we are certainly concerned about.”
Farris said he suspects that some guardians are vaping, and the kids will get a handle on the vape and take it to school, or the kid knows someone who can buy them a vape.
Farris said that often times, young kids will experiment with vapes without knowing where they came from or what’s in them. Farris said the best thing parents can do to help their children avoid the dangers of vaping is to have a conversation with them about how dangerous vaping can be.
