Because these black market products are a leading suspect in the lung-injury outbreak, product bans are more likely to exacerbate this crisis than to mitigate it.

The better, if more complicated, option would be to build a public health system that’s strong enough to combat all nicotine addiction in the long term. That, in turn, could help drive a cultural shift for e-cigarettes akin to the shift that took place for traditional cigarettes. Policy changes and growing public awareness — not product bans — helped turn what was considered a chic, stress-relieving diet tool into what is now more commonly viewed as a smelly, overpriced cancer stick.

With sustained and careful investment, e-cigarettes might become nothing more than a harm-reduction option for adult smokers — no more appealing to teenagers than a nicotine patch or a piece of nicotine gum. Here are some ideas for making that vision a reality.

Treat e-cigarettes like cigarettes. Traditional cigarettes and other tobacco products are already bound by a number of rules — including special taxes, advertising restrictions and age-verification requirements — that helped sharply lower both youth and adult smoking rates in recent decades. E-cigarette makers have evaded similar regulations, through a combination of lawsuits and intensive lobbying. (Among other things, the vaping industry has argued that e-cigarettes are not tobacco products because they contain only nicotine — but nicotine comes exclusively from the tobacco plant.) Congress could stop such antics with new legislation. A recently passed House bill that would mandate age verification for all online e-cigarette purchases is a welcome step in the right direction. Additional laws are needed to ensure that any rules applying to tobacco products also apply to e-cigarettes.

Learn from Britain. So far, the country has managed to make e-cigarettes available for adults who want to quit using regular cigarettes without triggering an epidemic of nicotine dependence among its youth. Public health experts say at least part of that success is due to the way these products are regulated in Britain. Packaging and advertising are tightly restricted — no bright, colorful labels or kid-friendly media campaigns allowed. And the nicotine content is capped. In America, where there are no such limits, e-cigarettes often contain more than twice as much nicotine as they do in Britain and are still being sold in ways designed to appeal to young children.