Renee Mendonca, activist and advocate for giving up vaping and nicotine, shared her personal story with The Gen Z Collective. Renee traded her 17th birthday presents to save lives of youth addicted to vaping. She asked all her friends to donate to St Jude Hospital as her BIRTHDAY GIFT. She raised 1,50,000 dollars for treatment of vaping addicts. Renee interviewed 1000 vaping addicts to study the vaping trends in high schools. She found 90% of students use JUUL as a first TOBACCO product because of youth appealing flavours. Renee came across the advertisement on Social Media by E-Cigarette Company, JUUL “SAVE ROOM FOR TASTY TREATS AND REWARDS”. She wrote a letter to E-Cigarette Company, JUUL, expressing her disapproval about using Social Media and dessert flavours to entice teenagers and hook them to Nicotine in disguise. Due to her strong letters, E-CIGARETTE COMPANY, JUUL, withdrew all its SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING CAMPAIGNS and FLAVOURED E-CIGARETTES targetting youth. She wrote letters to Presidents of 195 NATIONS to ban flavored e-cigarettes due to which 22 NATIONS have banned till date. Renee has launched the Anti-Vaping Campaigns in 10,000 Schools, Colleges and Youth Conferences. She has conducted SOCIAL MEDIA CAMPAIGNS by making YOUTUBE VIDEOS, APPLE PODCASTS, iTUNES, SPOTIFY to educate the youth about the dangers of vaping. The death of Renee’s beloved Grandpa to Pulmonary Fibrosis crumbled her life. He was a chain smoker from age 14. They could not afford a lung transplant. He died right before her eyes. From that day onwards, Renee vowed to save young lives caught in the web of addictions. Renee was invited to her friend's 16th birthday. Suddenly, she fell unconscious. To add to our sorrow, suddenly, this friend dropped down unconscious right before our eyes. She was rushed to the hospital by an ambulance. On medical investigation, it was found that her lungs had collapsed due to vaping JUUL for one year. This was the most heartbreaking time for her family and friends. From that day onwards, she has been in and out of the hospital. She confessed that she was not aware that JUUL had nicotine in it. She was attracted to JUUL because of tasty flavours such as cotton candy, gummy bears and creme. She was enticed to try JUUL after watching the advertisement “SAVE ROOM FOR TASTY TREATS AND REWARDS” These incidents in Renee’s life made her passionate about saving youth addicted to vaping .
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