July 28th, 2017
From: FDA Center for Tobacco Products
FDA announces comprehensive regulatory plan to shift trajectory of tobacco-related disease, death
Agency to pursue lowering nicotine in cigarettes to non-addictive levels and create more predictability in tobacco regulation
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The FDA plans to begin a public dialogue about lowering nicotine levels in combustible cigarettes to non-addictive levels through achievable product standards. The agency intends to issue an Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (ANPRM) to seek input on the potential public health benefits and any possible adverse effects of lowering nicotine in cigarettes. Because almost 90 percent of adult smokers started smoking before the age of 18 and nearly 2,500 youth smoke their first cigarette every day in the U.S., lowering nicotine levels could decrease the likelihood that future generations become addicted to cigarettes and allow more currently addicted smokers to quit.
July 19th, 2017
From: The Washington Post | Editorial
By Editorial Board
AMID THE nationwide furor over the Senate draft health-care bill, a public-health victory has gone mostly unnoticed. According to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the estimated number of middle and high school students who are tobacco users dropped from 4.7 million in 2015 to 3.9 million in 2016. This was largely driven by a reduction in the number of teenagers using e-cigarettes, which are less harmful than regular cigarettes but still contain nicotine. The downturn is a success for advocates and officials who have worked to curb teen tobacco use — but it should not be heralded as the end of the road.
July 7th, 2017
From: Vaping Post
Philip Morris International, the world’s second largest tobacco company is paying brand ambassadors £50 for successfully converting smokers into non-smokers.
By Diane Caruana
Last year PMI made headlines when Andre Calantzopoulos, the company’s CEO said that he would like “to work with governments towards the “phase-out” of conventional cigarettes”. Additionally Peter Nixon, the Managing Director for UK and Ireland had said, “We want to move towards a smoke-free future and a lot of that is incentivising people to move across from cigarettes to something that is less harmful.”
June 22nd, 2017
From: R Street
by Joel Nitzkin
As detailed this morning by the Food and Drug Administration, cigarette smoking by U.S. high school students has been cut in half since 2011—from 15.8 percent to 8.0 percent—a remarkable and previously unanticipated public health victory.
Unfortunately, it appears federal authorities may be misattributing the cause. In his announcement earlier today, FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb attributes most, if not all, of this reduction in smoking to a federally sponsored program that has only been in place since 2014. Despite substantial evidence in federally sponsored surveys in the United States and abroad showing that remarkable reductions in teen and adult smoking have been concurrent with the increasing popularity of e-cigarettes, the FDA announcement makes no reference to the possibility that much, if not most, of the recent reductions in teen smoking may be attributable to e-cigarettes.
June 15th, 2017
From: The Washington Post
By Laurie McGinley
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The Food and Drug Administration asserted its authority to regulate e-cigarettes and some other products in 2016. But in early May, it delayed for three months the enforcement of some regulations that were to be imposed for the first time on e-cigarettes and cigars.
