(NBC NEWSCHANNEL) 18-million middle and high school students are exposed to advertisements for e-cigarettes.
It's a statistic the government says is helping fuel a rapid rise of e-cigarette use among teens.
The Centers for Disease Controlreports e-cigarette ads are found in many places -- in stores, online, on TV, and in newspapers and magazines.
Data from the 2014 National Youth Tobacco survey shows nearly 70-percent of middle and high school students said they've seen the marketing.
E-cigarette use went from about 1-percent of high school students in 2011 to more than 13-percent by 2014.
E-cigarettes use a vapor to deliver a hit of nicotine. C-D-C Director Tom Frieden, MD says the chemical can be harmful to the developing teen brain. "There is an increasing amount of evidence that when an adolescent brain is exposed to nicotine, it changes the wiring of the brain in long-term or even permanent ways that can be very damaging and problematic in terms of addiction, tobacco, and other cognitive problems."
The Food and Drug Administration is expected to regulate e-cigarettes. However, those regulations have not yet been announced.
New numbers from #VitalSigns looks at e-cigarette marketing and teen e-cigarette use https://t.co/dh17ByurmW
— CDC (@CDCgov) January 5, 2016
