Children's vaping has the potential to be a public health disaster in the UK, experts have warned, amid fears the vaping boom could create a generation of young people addicted to nicotine.

Lindsay Smith's son was 14 when he bought his first e-cigarette. So engrossed in videos of YouTube users steaming ghost puffs, he decided to try it out himself.

At first, he would spend hours trying to imitate strangers online — sitting in his bedroom practicing his breathing techniques, creating the ghostly-shaped clouds he saw on screen.

When he started using the 2% nicotine watermelon flavoured e-cigarette he bought it from an older boy at school with pocket money of £5 a week, but his friends got 12.5% nicotine Illegal equipment - more than six times the legal limit.

"He started trying things stronger and stronger to make a splash," said Smith, 42, an exam developer in Crumlington, Northumberland. "He was obsessed with playing Minecraft before, now it's vaping."

Smith is one of many parents in the UK alarmed by the silent epidemic of vaping among children with little warning from health officials or the government of the risk of an epidemic.

Although it is illegal to sell these devices to people under the age of 18, research shows that over the past five years, the number of underage vapers has increased dramatically, and the percentage of 16- to 18-year-olds who say they have used e-cigarettes in the past Doubled according to Action on Smoking and Health in just 12 months.

Over the weekend, The Observer revealed that Elf Bar, one of the leading brands of disposable e-cigarettes, had apparently broken rules for marketing its products to young people on the social media app TikTok.

Now, children's respiratory doctors have criticized the government for failing to heed warnings about the risks of allowing e-cigarettes to be sold in child-friendly packaging that contains the names of popular sweets -- including banana shakes and jelly babies, both of which contain 2 percent nicotine , the highest concentration allowed in the UK.

Professor Andrew Bush, consultant paediatric chest doctor at Royal Brompton and Harefield Hospital, said: "I fear we are entering a public health catastrophe with a generation of children hooked on nicotine.

There are concerns about the long-term health effects of e-cigarettes, and many products sold in the UK are illegal and may contain banned chemicals or super-strong nicotine.

When Smith discovered her son's habit, she tried to stop it. She confiscated the nicotine-containing e-cigarettes, and as a compromise, she said he could have nicotine-free e-cigarettes so he could continue practicing his vaping skills without the addictive chemicals.

She thought he was going to get sick of it, but a few weeks later he started vaping again. Eight months later, he tried e-cigarettes containing THC (tetrahydrocannabinol, the main psychoactive component of marijuana) and synthetic cannabinoid flavors, and started smoking, also through classmates.

Sharon Carter, 47, faces a similar dilemma in Dursley, Gloucestershire, 300 miles away. Her son first tried vaping at age 11, three weeks after he was in middle school, after being puffed by an older child. She later found out that he and his friends had hidden vaping products in a tote bag hidden in the bushes, which they retrieved every afternoon on their way home from school.

The 12-year-old was caught vaping by a teacher outside the school gate and tried to secretly use a blueberry-flavored e-cigarette in his bedroom. "Not long after I walked in, I smelled it. He tried to disguise it as bubblegum. I searched his room and found it and told him," said Carter, an export expert.

The mother-of-two who tried to cut off his pocket money is now picking him up at the school building instead of walking him home. But so far, her efforts have been in vain. "I did everything I could, but I felt completely helpless," she said. "He loves running and football and he's very athletic, so I said you could be jeopardizing what you love most, but he just shrugged."

"It seems that the manufacturers designed them with young people in mind," she added. "When you smell a cigarette, it feels like bah, but the smell and taste of e-cigarettes is so appealing. It's like alcohol all over again."

A London father who did not want to be named echoed her concerns. He said his 16-year-old daughter, who has asthma, started vaping during GCSE to help her calm down and is now the equivalent of two packs of cigarettes a day. This is truly an epidemic among our teens.

Another parent said one of her teenage twins started vaping at 12, while her son started vaping at 14. At the same time, many children are addicted to nicotine, and the cigarette industry has a new customer base.

For years, ministers have been keen to promote e-cigarettes because of their low risk of smoking and believe they could play a key role in reducing the 78,000 deaths in the UK each year from smoking.

But teachers, medical experts and trade standards officials are increasingly concerned that e-cigarettes are too readily available for children. They said the devices should be quit tools, not cool ones, and called for tighter controls to ensure e-cigarettes are used only as quit products.

Sarah Brown, lecturer and consultant in paediatric respiratory medicine, said: "The medical community was blinded by the tobacco industry years ago in favor of cigarettes, and we are now in favor of e-cigarettes. As a colleague of mine said: fool me once and you're ashamed. Lied to me twice, shameful.

She added: "Children and young adults have different brains than adults, so they become addicted to nicotine much faster than adults. this is a big problem.

Brown also said the long-term effects of e-cigarettes are still largely unknown.

A collection of vaping products, some of which Maria King found in her son's bedroom. Companies have been accused of using child-friendly packaging to attract young people.

While e-cigarettes are considered a safer alternative to tobacco, they are still potentially dangerous to health. A December 2019 report published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine found that e-cigarette use significantly increases a person's risk of developing chronic lung diseases such as asthma, bronchitis and emphysema

Jonathan Grigg, a professor of pediatric respiratory and environmental medicine, is a co-author of a November 2018 paper in the Archives of Childhood Diseases that warns that thousands of children are at risk of complacency due to complacency Addicted to nicotine.

He said: "We see this happening and it's being ignored. The trajectory is obvious.

Former Barnardo chief executive Javed Khan has reviewed the government's ambitions to make England smoke-free by 2030, saying e-cigarettes need to be promoted to reduce smoking, but the government should do everything it can to prevent vaping among young people, including banning the use of e-cigarettes on children Friendly packaging and description.

A Department of Health and Social Care spokesman said the UK had some of the toughest vaping regulations in place to protect children and young people and was considering further steps.

"We are well aware that e-cigarettes should only be used to help people quit smoking. Children, young people or non-smokers should not use e-cigarettes."

Following a community appeal last week, more than 50 families from across the country contacted the Observer to share their experiences with teen vaping.

While most came from parents desperate to stop their kids from vaping, others were more nuanced.

A mother says her teenage daughter appears to have stopped self-harm since she started vaping. Another teenager who said hers claimed e-cigarettes helped him manage his stress and anger, which had previously triggered a debilitating health condition.

Others said they believed vaping was less harmful and would prefer their children to vape rather than smoke, drink or use drugs.

But all said they would rather their children not use e-cigarettes at all.

Maria King, a 47-year-old mother of two from Eastbourne, East Sussex, believes it is imperative to strengthen regulation and enforce existing advertising rules to prevent more children from vaping .

Her own son started vaping at 13 after vaping with friends over the summer and watching videos on TikTok showing vapers blowing funny rings. She said the habit made him irrational and agitated, and changed the vitality of the family.

She added: "In a family where we would play games on a Friday night, he would go and sit in his room by himself.

But business owner Kim said her 14-year-old son was so honest with her about her vaping that she has now been able to get him to quit by using low-intensity nicotine products.

She launched a petition calling on the government to crack down on companies she said were targeting children directly. “What we see as parents is that what they look like — slush puppies, Skittles, Fanta — is not marketed to current smokers over 18,” she said.

She added: "We can't keep our kids locked up and we shouldn't. Those who make these products so appealing and accessible need to stop.