Big Apple parents — and their high school-age kids too — said Thursday they were thrilled that President Trump will ban flavored e-cigarettes.
“I’m totally in favor of the ban, obviously for the kids’ sake,” parent Mindy Koenig told The Post on Thursday morning while dropping off her 13-year-old son at JHS 190 in Forest Hills, Queens.
“It’s dangerous for their health. Kids shouldn’t be smoking anything … I’ve seen kids vaping on Austin Street. They look stupid but they think they are all grown-up. They think it’s cool to do it.”
Nicole Freyeisen, a 15-year-old 10th-grader at IS 25 in Flushing, said e-cigarette companies are absolutely “targeting” her and her peers.
“They make the flavors we like. I don’t think they’re making cotton candy flavor for adults,” Nicole said.
“Half the school is vaping. I see them every day doing it in the bathroom, classroom, schoolyard … [companies] just care about the money! Not if we live or die,” added senior Justine Cora, 17.
The comments come after the White House announced an upcoming temporary ban on flavored e-cigarettes on Wednesday.
The FDA will pull all flavored e-cigarettes off the shelves, and online, in the next few months and will only allow them back on the market once companies undergo a rigorous application and approval process that could take up to a year or longer.
The decision comes amid a nationwide vaping crisis in which at least six people have died from vaping-related mystery lung illnesses and another 450 people have been hospitalized across 33 states, including 49 in New York, records show.
It also comes as e-cigarette use continues to skyrocket among kids.
On Tuesday, the city Department of Health released data showing some 13,000 middle school students puffed on an e-cigarette last year while a total of 29,000 middle schoolers said they’ve tried a vape at least once.
That’s on top of data showing one in six city high school students reported using e-cigarettes in a 2017 survey.
Nationwide, at least 5 million kids reportedly are using e-cigarettes, according to the Department of Health and Human Services.
Critics of e-cigarettes have slammed manufacturers for producing candy and fruit flavors, which they believe are targeted at kids.
Farruh Abrorov, a 16-year-old junior at Forest Hills High School, said the temporary ban is a good move because he’s tired of seeing his friends getting addicted to vaping.
“Some of my friends are just dumb and think it’s better than cigarettes but it’s bad for you,” Farruh told The Post.
“Day by day teenagers are smoking and messing up their lives. People are dying from it. Most kids like the flavored ones because it tastes good. I tried it and was like, this is not good. You get addicted and it’s bad.”
David Persaud, 36, has an 11-year-old son in the sixth grade at JHS 190.
“Me and his mother had a very long discussion with him before the school year started. We told him, ‘You have to be careful,’” Persaud said.
The dad, who works as a super, said he recently caught a 13-year-old in the building’s laundry room puffing on a vape pen.
“I say, ‘Dude, what are you doing? You are only 13?’ He was cutting school and hanging out in my laundry room. I made him leave,” Persaud recounted.
Melissa Jasmine, whose son is in seventh grade at MS 297 in Greenwich Village, told The Post she recently caught him vaping in a park near his old school.
She praised Trump’s decision as the right move.
“It’s fine he wants to ban e-cigarettes. I don’t know much about [them] but I heard the chemicals inside of it are bad,” Jasmine said.
Additional reporting by Lorena Mongelli and Elizabeth Rosner