(CNN) The US Food and Drug Administration announced on Thursday a plan to clear the market of most flavors for cartridge-based e-cigarettes in the United States.

Under the new policy , vape companies will have 30 days from when the policy publishes in the federal register to stop manufacturing, distributing and selling flavored cartridge-based e-cigarettes, other than tobacco or menthol, the US Department of Health and Human Services announced on Thursday.

The policy will not apply to flavored products for open tank systems that are sold in vape shops. Cartridge-based e-cigarettes have been popular among youth.

"The United States has never seen an epidemic of substance use arise as quickly as our current epidemic of youth use of e-cigarettes. HHS is taking a comprehensive, aggressive approach to enforcing the law passed by Congress, under which no e-cigarettes are currently on the market legally," HHS Secretary Alex Azar said in Thursday's announcement.

"By prioritizing enforcement against the products that are most widely used by children, our action today seeks to strike the right public health balance by maintaining e-cigarettes as a potential off-ramp for adults using combustible tobacco while ensuring these products don't provide an on-ramp to nicotine addiction for our youth. We will not stand idly by as this crisis among America's youth grows and evolves, and we will continue monitoring the situation and take further actions as necessary," he said.

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