Juul, a US manufacturer of electronic cigarettes, has reached a settlement in the United States under which it will have to pay 462 million dollars to put an end to a series of lawsuits. According to The Guardian, six states in the country, including California and New York, sued the company for “illegally marketing its addictive products to minors”.
After reaching this settlement, the e-cigarette company will have paid a total of more than 1 billion dollars to a total of 45 states. For the time being, Juul still faces several lawsuits filed by the states of Minnesota, Florida, Michigan, Maine and Alaska. In addition to the state lawsuits, the company agreed last year to pay $1.7 billion to settle thousands of lawsuits from local government entities and individual consumers.
Juul was forced to withdraw most of its flavors from the market and halt much of its advertising in 2019 under pressure from U.S. regulators. In June last year, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration partially banned the products, although it put the ban on hold and agreed to reconsider the move after the company appealed.
But this issue does not affect Juul alone. The company’s largest investor, cigarette manufacturer Marlboro, is also facing a series of lawsuits for its alleged role in the marketing of Juul’s e-cigarettes, and has so far failed to reach an agreement with the authorities.
Although the use of electronic cigarettes has become popular in recent years among smokers and even non-smokers, most of them contain nicotine, the addictive substance found in regular cigarettes, cigars and other tobacco products. A serious issue, since nicotine in adolescence can damage the parts of the brain that control attention, learning, mood and impulse control.
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