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‘If signed into law, it would mean by 2073 people wanting to buy cigarettes would have to show ID to prove they are at least 67 years old.’
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Tag: Smoking
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Notable & Quotable: In California, Marijuana Si, Smoking No – Medical Marijuana Program Connection
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Murder of Vermont woman solved after more than 50 years using DNA found on a cigarette and the victim’s clothing | CNN
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CNN
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More than 50 years after Rita Curran’s roommate found her strangled to death in her room, police in Vermont say they have identified the killer using DNA found on a cigarette butt and Curran’s clothing.
Investigators identified William DeRoos, a man who lived in Curran’s Burlington apartment building, as the person responsible with the help of advances in DNA technology and genetic genealogy, police in Vermont’s most populous city announced Tuesday.
DeRoos died of a drug overdose in San Francisco in 1986, police said. The case is now closed.
On the night of the July 1971 killing, DeRoos, who lived with his wife two floors above Curran, had a fight with his spouse and left their apartment to “cool down,” according to a Burlington police investigation report.
Curran, 24, was later found dead, severely beaten after apparently having put up a “vicious struggle,” a detective wrote at the time. Investigators are now “unanimously certain” DeRoos was responsible, the report released Tuesday says.
But when investigators questioned DeRoos and his wife the next morning, the couple said they had been together all night and didn’t hear or see anything. After police left, DeRoos told his wife if they were questioned again, she should not admit that he had left the apartment “or they would go after him” because he had a criminal history, police said during a news conference Tuesday.
A break in the case finally came in 2014 when a DNA profile was extracted from a cigarette butt that had been found next to Curran’s body, Detective Lt. James Trieb said at the news conference. Though the profile was submitted to a national criminal database for DNA, he said, no matches were made. That meant the person with that DNA likely never had genetic material entered into the database, possibly because the person didn’t have a felony conviction.
In 2019, Trieb reopened the case and decided to take a new approach.
Instead of having a single detective work the cold case alone – the department’s usual strategy – he treated the crime as if it had just been committed, bringing in a team of detectives and expert technicians to review and discuss it, his investigation report says.
The team began retesting evidence, Trieb said, and decided to analyze the cigarette DNA using genetic genealogy – a process that uses DNA databases for genealogy research to identify possible family members of the person whose DNA is unmatched.
An outside genetic genealogy expert then concluded that the cigarette DNA had strong connections to relatives of DeRoos, both on the paternal and maternal sides.
“She was certain that it was William DeRoos” who put his DNA on the cigarette, the police report says.
Why your DNA may be solving cold cases
Investigators then found a living half-brother of DeRoos who was willing to provide a DNA sample, and that sample bolstered the conclusion that the cigarette DNA belonged to DeRoos, the report says.
Finally, investigators found that DNA left on Curran’s ripped house coat also matched the DNA on the cigarette butt, the report reads. Investigators re-interviewed his then-wife, who admitted that she had lied about DeRoos’ alibi.
At the news conference, acting Burlington Police Chief Jon Murad said the day was “filled with mixed emotions.”
“Ultimately, those emotions are ones of relief, of pride for me (and) for this department, but mostly of gratitude to a family that has been through an incredible ordeal for more than half a century,” he said.
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Workers await as NJ lawmakers debate casino smoking ban
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TRENTON, N.J. — It’s often said that people who really want something are breathlessly anticipating it. But for a large group of Atlantic City casino workers who have been waiting 17 years for state lawmakers to consider ending smoking in casinos, that’s almost literally true.
Dealers, cocktail servers and other casino workers — some of them with breathing ailments and other health problems they suspect are related to secondhand smoke from casino patrons — are eagerly awaiting Monday’s hearing before a New Jersey Senate committee on legislation that would prohibit smoking in Atlantic City’s nine casinos.
The bill would close a loophole in the state’s 2006 indoor smoking law written specifically to exempt casinos from bans on smoking indoors. Currently, smoking is permitted on 25% of a casino floor in Atlantic City.
Whether to ban smoking is one of the most controversial issues not only in Atlantic City casinos, but in other states where workers have expressed concern about secondhand smoke. They are waging similar campaigns in Rhode Island, Pennsylvania and Virginia.
The Casino Association of New Jersey, the trade group for Atlantic City’s casinos, has long opposed a smoking ban, predicting it would cost the industry jobs and revenue. But smoking opponents dispute those assertions, citing research from Las Vegas-based C3 Gaming that showed non-smoking casinos in several markets are now outperforming those where smoking is permitted.
Mark Giannantonio, president of Resorts Casino and head of the trade group, did not respond to a request for comment before Monday’s hearing.
The casinos also note they have spent millions on ventilation and other air purification systems. Workers and health industry groups contend there’s no level of secondhand smoke considered safe for humans.
Support for a smoking ban is widespread among New Jersey lawmakers: Identical smoking ban bills are sponsored or co-sponsored by 51 Assembly members and 23 state Senators, representing a bipartisan majority in both chambers.
The bills have repeatedly been introduced in the Legislature, only to sit untouched for several years not only without a vote, but without so much as a discussion.
That discussion is set to happen Monday afternoon, although a vote will not be taken that day.
New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy, a Democrat, has promised to sign the bill if it’s passed by the Legislature.
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Follow Wayne Parry on Twitter at www.twitter.com/WayneParryAC.
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Tobacco and e-cigs may put healthy young people at risk of severe COVID illness, new UCLA research suggests
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EMBARGOED FOR USE UNTIL 5 p.m. PT/8 p.m. ET on Thursday, Feb. 9, 2023
Newswise — New UCLA research suggests that smoking tobacco and vaping electronic cigarettes may increase healthy young people’s risk for developing severe COVID illness.
This is among the first studies to find that not only smoking tobacco, but also vaping, may predispose people to increased inflammation and future development of severe COVID-19 and the lingering cardiovascular complications that can occur after initial illness from the virus, said Dr. Theodoros Kelesidis, the study’s lead author.
“The key message is that smoking is the worst, but vaping is not innocent,” said Kelesidis, associate professor of medicine in the division of infectious diseases at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. “This has been shown for many lung diseases but not for COVID. It was a quite interesting and novel finding that vaping changed the levels of key proteins that the virus uses to replicate.”
The study will be published Feb.9 in the peer-reviewed Journal of Molecular Medicine.
The investigators examined plasma collected before the pandemic from 45 non-smokers, 30 electronic cigarette vapers, and 29 tobacco cigarette smokers, testing it to measure levels of since-identified proteins that SARS-CoV-2, the virus at the heart of the pandemic, needs in order to replicate. These proteins are ACE2, furin, Ang II, Ang 1–7, IL-6R, sCD163, L-selectin. The three latter proteins are collectively regulated in cells by a protein known as ADAM17.
They found that plasma from healthy young people who smoke tobacco or vape had increased levels of furin, sCD163, and L-selectin compared to non-smokers. These data suggest that there may be increased activity of the proteins furin and ADAM17 in the immune cells as well as surface cells, such as those lining the lungs, in healthy young smokers and vapers.
“E-cigarette vapers may be at higher risk than non-smokers of developing infections and inflammatory disorders of the lungs,” Kelesidis said. “Electronic cigarettes are not harmless and should be used for only the shortest time possible in smoking cessation, and not at all by nonsmokers.”
Limitations include the small size of the study, which suggests the need for research with a larger sample size; the reliance on testing blood plasma rather than tissue samples such as lung cells that are believed to be affected by smoking and vaping, which also warrants deeper research; and a lack of evidence of the role that the ADAM17 proteins may play in severe COVID illness among non-smokers.
Study co-authors are Madhav Sharma, Sandro Satta, Elizabeth Tran, Rajat Gupta, Dr. Jesus Araujo, and Dr. Holly Middlekauff of UCLA.
The study was funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the Tobacco-Related Disease Research Program (TRDRP 28IR0065), the University of California Office of the President (R00RG2749 Emergency COVID-19 Research Seed Funding), and by the NIH National Center for Advancing Translational Science (NCATS) UCLA CTSI (L1TR001881).
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University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), Health Sciences
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Most US adults support banning sales of all tobacco products, CDC survey says | CNN
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CNN
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More than half of US adults support ending the sale of all tobacco products, according to a new study led by researchers from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and nearly two-thirds said they support banning menthol cigarette sales.
The poll, published Thursday in the journal Preventing Chronic Disease, included 6,455 US adults surveyed in 2021 – before the US Food and Drug Administration proposed a ban on menthol cigarettes and flavored cigars.
Although cigarette smoking has declined in recent decades, it remains the leading cause of preventable disease, disability and death in the US, where an estimated 30.8 million adults currently smoke.
Support for proposals to ban tobacco sales was lower among current tobacco users, according to the survey. More than a third of current smokers supported banning menthol cigarette sales, and more than a quarter supported banning all tobacco sales.
The FDA is still considering its proposed ban on menthol cigarettes and flavored cigars.
“The proposed rules would help prevent children from becoming the next generation of smokers and help adult smokers quit,” Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra said in a statement when the proposal was announced. “Additionally, the proposed rules represent an important step to advance health equity by significantly reducing tobacco-related health disparities.”
In the new study, researchers reported widespread support for a menthol ban across demographic groups.
“Our findings are generally consistent with previous research showing support for menthol cigarette sales prohibitions, including among population groups historically targeted by unjust marketing practices and with a high prevalence of menthol cigarette use (eg, non-Hispanic Black adults),” they wrote in the study.
Experts say menthol – the last flavor allowed in cigarettes – makes smoking easier to start and harder to quit. The additive can mask the harshness and irritation of tobacco, making cigarettes more appealing to young people and those who have never used tobacco products. It also enhances the effect of nicotine in the brain, making tobacco products even more addictive.
Research has shown that tobacco products, especially those with menthol, are disproportionately marketed to youth, racial and ethnic minorities, lower-income people and those who identify as LGBTQ+, all of whom are more likely to use these products and develop tobacco-related health problems.
“The science is clear: Menthol cigarettes have an adverse impact on public health and have no public health benefits as compared to non-menthol cigarettes,” American Heart Association CEO Nancy Brown said in a statement last year. “They increase the likelihood and degree of addiction among youth smokers, elevating the number of premature deaths from tobacco use. Their removal from the market would have enormous benefits for public health in this country.”
One study published in 2021 estimated that a menthol cigarette ban in the US would result in a 15% reduction in smoking as early as 2026 and up to 650,000 lives saved within 40 years.
Many parts of the country have started moving in this direction. As of February 2022, at least 145 US communities prohibit the sale of menthol cigarettes and other flavored products. Beverly Hills and Manhattan Beach, California, were the first cities to prohibit all tobacco sales.
The study authors say public support can continue to be an influential factor in the acceleration of policy adoption.
“These findings can inform federal, state, and local efforts to prohibit all tobacco product sales, including menthol cigarettes, reduce tobacco use and tobacco-related disparities, and advance health equity.”
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Smoke-Filled Rooms Back In Capitol Under Republicans
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In a flashback to decades past, some congressional offices are filling up again with pungent cigar smoke from apparently lung-cancer-blasé Republicans, evoking renewed images of smoky rooms filled with cigar-chomping deal makers.
Reuters reporter Patricia Zengerle believes the smoke is prevalent now because there are more Republican smokers — perhaps opting to partake in cigars in their offices — since the party won the House majority.
“So there’s indoor smoking on the House side of the Capitol now that the Republicans have taken control,” Zengerle reported earlier this week.
Some reporters quipped the lawmakers were “hotboxing” cigar smoke — smoking in confined spaces, which is used more typically to refer to inhaling joints.
“When you have a change in party control, and they move offices like they just did if the member who moves into the office is … a cigar smoker — you have smoke,” Zengerle wrote.
The District of Columbia requires all public buildings to be smoke-free, and an executive order signed by former President Bill Clinton prohibits smoking in federal buildings. But House lawmakers’ private offices are exempted, making the Capitol one of the few “office buildings” left in the nation where smoking is allowed inside, Bloomberg noted.
A Daily Beast political reporter complained in a tweet about “cigar hotboxing” in a “certain Rules Committee chairman’s office” near the House press gallery. She added that the smell permeates “multiple floors” because his office is near a “high-use” elevator.
House Rules Committee Chairman Rep. Tom Cole of Oklahoma (R-Okla.) can often be found smoking in his committee’s area on the third floor of the Capitol, Bloomberg noted. In addition, Cole has been a speaker at Cigar Association events.
Pressed about the smoke oozing outside his office this week, Cole reportedly vowed: “I’m not giving up cigars.”
Several others on Twitter shared concerns about the health impact of those inhaling second-hand smoke and the possible airborne nicotine damage to the walls and treasured artwork in the Capitol.
A long series of efforts beginning in 1871 to sharply curtail smoking in the Capitol did not block congressional lawmakers from smoking in their offices, subjecting visiting constituents and staff to the smoke.
Republican leaders have a particular reputation as smokers.
Former House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) smoked so many cigarettes that incoming Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) needed new carpets, new paint and an ozone machine to purify the air — at taxpayer expense — to make the place usable again in 2015, The New York Times reported at the time.
Former Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) banned smoking from much of the building in 2007, including the popular speaker’s lobby, when Democrats were in charge — but members could still smoke in their offices.
Smoking is not permitted anywhere on the Senate side of the Capitol. The Centers for Disease Control says cigarette smoking is responsible for 480,000 deaths a year in the U.S., with about 41,000 of those due to inhaling second-hand smoke.
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您在这里：抽烟者的戒烟指南
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如果您是一名抽烟者，您可能正处于想要戒烟的阶段，但需要一份指南，指引您如何从抽烟的”这里”到达不抽烟的”那里”。以下是明尼苏达州曼凯托妙佑区域医疗系统的精神病学家Patrick Bigaouette医学博士关于如何开始您的无烟之旅的建议。
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Mayo Clinic
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أنت “هنا”: دليل المدخن للإقلاع عن التدخين
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إذا كنت مدخنًا ، فربما تكون قد وصلت إلى النقطة التي تريد التوقف عندها ، لكنك بحاجة إلى دليل ينقلك من “هنا” ، أي أنني أدخن إلى “هناك” ، أي تركت. فيما يلي نصائح حول كيفية البدء في رحلتك للإقلاع عن التدخين من MD ، MD ، Patrick Pejauette ، MD ، من Mayo Clinic Health System في مانكاتو ، مينيسوتا..
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Mayo Clinic
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Vapor Technology Association Statement on Critical Reagan-Udall Foundation Final Report
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Leading Vapor Trade Group Urges FDA to Adopt Reforms to Protect Sanctity of Scientific Process
Press Release
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Dec 20, 2022
WASHINGTON, December 20, 2022 (Newswire.com)
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Following the Reagan Udall Foundation release of their final report reviewing the operations of FDA’s tobacco program, Vapor Technology Association Executive Director Tony Abboud released the following statement:“The Reagan-Udall Foundation’s independent review of FDA’s tobacco program has uncovered systemic problems inside the Center for Tobacco Products that allowed political decisions to override the science-based recommendations of FDA professional staff concerning the authorization of vaping products that would provide safer alternatives for adult smokers looking to quit combustible cigarettes.
“The Reagan-Udall review was requested by FDA Commissioner Califf to address problems with the Center for Tobacco Products (CTP) programs for regulations and guidance, application review, compliance and enforcement, and communication with the public and other stakeholders. Their observations included the following:
- CTP has no strategic plan and must create one that identifies the Center’s strategic objectives and plots an operational roadmap to achieve them.
- CTP must resolve how to weigh the public health benefits of adults who use ENDS that will completely quit smoking combustible tobacco products against the potential public health harms to youth who use ENDS.
- CTP has not clearly articulated what is required to meet the appropriateness for the protection of public health standard.
- CTP struggles to function as a regulator due to some of its own policy choices.
- CTP faces significant challenges in clearing policies through the career and political infrastructure.
- CTP lacks consistent implementation of its own policies, particularly with respect to harm reduction.
- CTP has not been transparent regarding its failure to clear the market of illegal products.
- CTP’s current goals and priorities are unclear in communication and practice.
“The Vapor Technology Association has raised concerns for years about the opaque and questionable operations of the CTP. Reagan-Udall’s review highlights a shifting and arbitrary decision-making process, untethered from science due to political or external pressures, that has damaged the marketplace for safer vaping products, impaired the FDA’s credibility, undermined the FDA’s mission of harm reduction by denying millions of American smokers truthful information and authorized products. We are pleased to see many of the recommendations VTA provided to the Reagan-Udall Foundation reflected in the Foundation’s report.
“The fact that CTP has continued to issue major decisions despite deficiencies highlighted by Reagan-Udall is highly questionable. VTA agrees that ‘CTP must invest the time, now’…to create and implement a Strategic Plan’ and that ‘the path to resolving many of the Center’s current challenges starts with establishing the scientific and policy framework to make clear and timely product decisions.’ For that reason, the FDA Commissioner should instruct CTP to stand down on issuing any further denials of less harmful nicotine alternative product applications until CTP has been able to review and implement the safeguards and recommendations made by the Reagan-Udall Foundation, and VTA stands ready to assist FDA and CTP by providing the necessary stakeholder input that the Foundation also said was necessary,” said Tony Abboud.
ABOUT VTA
The Vapor Technology Association is the U.S. industry trade association whose members are dedicated to sound science-based regulation and selling innovative high-quality vapor products that provide adult smokers with a better alternative to combustible cigarettes. VTA represents the industry-leading manufacturers of vapor devices, e-liquids, and flavorings, as well as the distributors and retailers, including hardworking American mom-and-pop brick-and-mortar retail store owners.Source: Vapor Technology Association
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Tobacco use, incidence of adverse oral health outcomes
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Newswise — About The Study: This nationally representative cohort study found associations of current combustible tobacco use with the incidence of adverse oral health outcomes and also found an association between current electronic nicotine delivery systems use and the incidence of bleeding after brushing or flossing. These findings highlight the importance of longitudinal studies and emphasize the continued importance of tobacco cessation counseling and resources in clinical practice.
Authors: Marushka L. Silveira, B.D.S., M.P.H., Ph.D., of the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland, is the corresponding author.
Editor’s Note: Please see the article for additional information, including other authors, author contributions and affiliations, conflict of interest and financial disclosures, and funding and support.
# # #
Embed this link to provide your readers free access to the full-text article This link will be live at the embargo time http://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2022.45909?utm_source=For_The_Media&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=ftm_links&utm_term=120922
About JAMA Network Open: JAMA Network Open is an online-only open access general medical journal from the JAMA Network. On weekdays, the journal publishes peer-reviewed clinical research and commentary in more than 40 medical and health subject areas. Every article is free online from the day of publication.
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JAMA – Journal of the American Medical Association
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Solutions to Tackling Smoking Rates
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Newswise — Every year, the Great American Smokeout draws attention to preventing deaths and chronic illness caused by smoking. Almost 38 million Americans, including nearly one million in New Jersey, still smoke tobacco and about half of all smokers die from smoking-related illnesses.
Here, Michael Steinberg, professor and chief in the Division of General Internal Medicine at Robert Wood Johnson Medical School and Medical Director of the Rutgers Center for Tobacco Studies, which operates the Tobacco Dependence Program to help people quit tobacco, and Andrea Villanti, associate professor in the Department of Health Behavior, Society and Policy at the Rutgers School of Public Health and Deputy Director of the Rutgers Center for Tobacco Studies, discuss challenges to change smoking rates.
Smoking rates have significantly dropped over time. Why should we still be concerned about trends in tobacco use?
Villanti: While the rates of cigarette smoking have declined over the past several decades, we know those gains have been inconsistent. In a study published in JAMA Network Open, we found high smoking prevalence and lower quit ratios in rural versus urban areas. In addition to where people live, other research shows there are disparities in tobacco use based on social and demographic factors such as race and ethnicity, age, sexual orientation, disability status, socioeconomic status and/or behavioral health status.
Steinberg: Related to this, we know there still a lot of work to be done to decrease tobacco use in patients with substance use disorder, depression and other psychiatric conditions, who continue to use tobacco at much higher rates than the general public. In our own research, we found that while most psychiatrists ask patients if they smoke, advise quitting and assess willingness to quit, a much smaller percent of psychiatrists assist patients with establishing quit plans or arranging for follow up. There are many competing priorities for health professionals; we want them to know they can refer patients to quitting resources like the Rutgers’ Tobacco Dependence Program or any of New Jersey’s 11 Quit Centers.
Why is now a good time to quit?
Steinberg: In addition to providing a time for people to quit during the Great American Smokeout on November 17, fall and winter can bring a surge of flu and COVID-19 cases, which are contagious respiratory illnesses. Smoking reduces lung capacity and increases the risk for respiratory infections. Quitting smoking can result in immediate benefits to health.
How has the COVID-19 pandemic impacted tobacco treatment delivery?
Steinberg: The COVID-19 pandemic posed challenges to all types of health care delivery but it also resulted in new opportunities. In a study conducted across 34 National Cancer Institute–designated cancer centers, including Rutgers Cancer Institute of New Jersey, we found that centers that adopted telehealth practices were able to maintain tobacco treatment for patients who smoke. Here at Rutgers, we continue to offer one-on-one and group counseling in both virtually and in-person.
Villanti: Text messaging interventions can also be another way to help people quit smoking, particularly people not currently accessing tobacco treatment. In a randomized controlled trial, we found that low-income young adults engaging in a 12-week tailored text message smoking cessation intervention produced greater smoking abstinence than referral to online quit resources. Smokefree.gov offers a variety of free and tailored text messaging programs that provide help on-demand and around the clock. Some states also provide text messaging assistance through their tobacco quitlines.
What advice do you have for people who want to quit using tobacco?
Steinberg: We encourage people with an interest in quitting to reach out. Whether it is for your health, your wallet, your family or just not wanting to be addicted any longer, this is a great time to make the effort to stop – and we can help!
Villanti: Use every tool in the toolbox! Counseling, medication, support from friends and family, quitlines and above all, the willingness to keep trying even if you slip. It’s hard to quit using tobacco, but every try counts.
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Rutgers University-New Brunswick
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US government seeks court injunctions against six e-cigarette manufacturers as FDA steps up enforcement | CNN
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CNN
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The US Department of Justice took legal action against six e-cigarette manufacturers Tuesday, seeking permanent injunctions against the manufacturers on behalf of the US Food and Drug Administration. The flurry of complaints marked the first time the FDA has taken this step against e-cigarette manufacturers to enforce its premarket review requirements for new tobacco products.
The six manufacturers failed to submit the necessary premarket applications for their e-cigarette products “and have continued to illegally manufacture, sell, and distribute their products, despite previous warning from the FDA that they were in violation of the law,” the FDA said in a statement.
“Today’s enforcement actions represent a significant step for the FDA in preventing tobacco product manufacturers from violating the law,” said Brian King, director of the FDA’s Center for Tobacco Products. “We will not stand by as manufacturers repeatedly break the law, especially after being afforded multiple opportunities to comply.”
The Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act requires that companies submit applications to the FDA and get them approved before manufacturing, selling or distributing new tobacco products. Companies that had products on the market before this provision took effect still had to submit applications.
The FDA says it issued nearly 300 warning letters between January 2021 and September 9, 2022, for failure to submit applications, and most of those companies have removed their products from the market. This month, the agency sent a warning letter to the maker of Puff Bar products, which are especially popular among young people, for operating without a marketing authorization order. In June, the agency ordered e-cigarette giant Juul Labs to remove its products from the market, but a court blocked that ban, so those products are still available.
Advocates have criticized the FDA as too slow to act on a majority of the premarket applications. In May, the agency announced that it would not finish reviewing all the premarket applications from e-cigarette companies until June 2023, nearly two years past its court-ordered deadline to make a decision about those products.
Erika Sward, assistant vice president for national advocacy for the American Lung Association, said Tuesday’s actions send “a very important message to manufacturers that that they need to follow the law.”
“This is a monumental first step forward for FDA and DOJ, and we are really encouraged by this action,” she said. “I’m really pleased that this is the kind of step forward. This is what FDA needed to do from the beginning, and we’re very pleased to see this.”
Sward credited King, who was named director of the Center for Tobacco Products in July, with providing the impetus for the increased actions.
“We are very hopeful that this indicates that FDA and DOJ will take more of these steps against other recalcitrant manufacturers,” she said. “And we also very much hope the manufacturers get the message that under Dr. King’s leadership, this is a different Center for Tobacco Products.”
The complaints were brought against manufacturers that the FDA alleges continued to make and distribute nicotine products even after they were warned that they were in violation of the law. According to the court filings, the six manufacturers all received warning letters from the FDA informing them that they were manufacturing tobacco products that lacked the required approval.
Several of the defendants also participated in teleconferences with the FDA after receiving the warning letters, the government said. Some of the manufacturers allegedly told the agency that they would cease manufacturing and distributing the nicotine products in question, but follow-up inspections showed that the products were still being manufactured and sold, according to the complaints.
“These cases are an important step in stopping the illegal sale of unauthorized electronic nicotine delivery system products,” Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Brian M. Boynton, who leads the DOJ’s Civil Division, said in a statement. “The Department of Justice will continue to work closely with FDA to stop the distribution of illegal, unauthorized tobacco products.”
The six companies named in Tuesday’s court filings are Morin Enterprises Inc., doing business as E-Cig Crib, in Minnesota; Soul Vapor LLC in West Virginia; Super Vape’z LLC in Washington; Vapor Craft LLC in Georgia; Lucky’s Convenience & Tobacco LLC, doing business as Lucky’s Vape & Smoke Shop, in Kansas; and Seditious Vapours LLC, doing business as Butt Out, in Arizona. The companies have not yet responded to CNN’s requests for comment.
“Mr. King seems delighted to kick in the doors of small businesses but turns a blind eye to the millions of Americans who rely on nicotine vaping to quit cigarettes,” Amanda Wheeler, president of the American Vapor Manufacturers Association, said in a statement. “The ongoing result is countless people being driven back to smoking.”
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Current FDA oversight of vaping industry likely to have minimal impact
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Newswise — Current Food and Drug Administration (FDA) oversight of the vaping industry in the US is likely to have minimal impact, suggests an analysis of the regulator’s warning letters for marketing violations, published online in the journal Tobacco Control.
The regulator is failing to target the key players or the products most popular with young people, the analysis suggests, with over 90% of warnings sent to small online retailers rather than leading tobacco companies, and a focus on refillable devices.
While the prevalence of vaping among US adults remains low, at just under 4% in 2020, it is four times higher among young people.
In 2016 the FDA announced plans to regulate the vaping industry, including a requirement for the manufacturers of e-cigarettes to obtain pre-market approval (PMTA) to ensure that their products protect public health.
In 2017, the regulator began sending warning letters to manufacturers, retailers, and distributors for potential violations, such as advertising to young people, selling to minors, packaging or labelling that contravened regulations, and failure to apply for a PMTA.
But little is known about who received these letters, the types of product they concerned, or details of the violations and their consequences.
To try and find out, the authors from non-profit tobacco control organisation, Truth Initiative, assessed the content and recipients of publicly available FDA warning letters issued in 2020 and 2021. In total, the FDA issued 303 warnings:126 in 2020 and 177 up to 9 September 2021.
The analysis revealed that in 2021, over 98% of all the targeted companies fulfilled all three roles (manufacturer, distributor and retailer).
But nearly all the letters (97%) were sent to small online retailers, none of which was a large company with measurable market share, as evidenced by sales data.
Companies were cited for between one and three infractions. Most involved failure to obtain a PMTA. In 2020 and 2021, respectively, 56% and 99%+ of the infractions concerned a PMTA violation.
And more than 90% of the products cited–880 different ones in total–were flavoured refillable e-cigarette liquids, rather than the disposable vaping devices (‘pod mods’) which the evidence indicates are most popular with young people.
Penalties ranged in severity from product detention to product seizure and fines. But loss of tobacco distributor licence and criminal charges appeared less frequently in both years than these other consequences.
At the time of the review, most (72%) of the websites cited for 2020 infractions were still operating, as were 29% of websites cited for 2021 infractions.
And as the authors note, it was impossible to find out how the targeted companies responded, and whether the FDA followed through with the consequences cited in the warning letters, because that information isn’t publicly available.
“While current research estimates that online sales comprise around one-third of the marketplace, data tell us that most young people get their products from friends (32.3%), buy them from another person (21.5%), or purchase from a vape shop (22.2%),” note the authors.
“Prioritising the products most accessed by youth which are made available from a variety of sources will be important to curb youth use,” they add.
And they emphasise:“Strong, impactful and transparent consequences need to be in place to prevent the sale of products that violate regulations necessary in protecting the health of adult users of e-cigarettes and preventing youth use alike.”
“The FDA should use its enforcement powers to target the manufacturing, distribution, and sellers of the tobacco products that have the greatest impact on youth and products that provide no public health benefit,” they conclude.
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BMJ
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Economic Loss from U.S. Cigarette Smoking Topped Almost $900 Billion in 2020, New Study Shows
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EMBARGOED FOR RELEASE – 6:30 p.m., EDT – September 28, 2022
Newswise — ATLANTA, September 28, 2022 — New findings by the American Cancer Society (ACS) found cumulative economic losses from cigarette smoking topped $891 billion in 2020, or 4.3% of the United States Gross Domestic Product. The economic loss significantly outpaced the cigarette industry’s $92 billion revenue by nearly a ten-to-one ratio. The study was published today in the journal The Lancet Public Health.
This economic modelling study is one of the first to provide a comprehensive measure of economic loss from cigarette smoking on a state-by-state level. On average, states lost $1,100.00 per capita income annually from cigarette smoking. Kentucky ($1,674.00), West Virginia ($1,605.00) and Arkansas ($1,603.00) suffered the largest per capita income losses, while Utah ($331.00), Idaho ($680.00) and Arizona ($701.00) had the smallest per capita income losses.
“Economic losses from cigarette smoking far outweigh any economic benefit from the tobacco industry — wages, and salaries of those employed by the industry, tax revenue, and industry profit combined,” said Dr. Nigar Nargis, senior scientific director, tobacco control research at the American Cancer Society. “As a society, we can mitigate these economic losses through coordinated and comprehensive evidence-based tobacco control measures, which encourage people to quit smoking and prevent people from starting to smoke in the first place.”
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services set the Healthy People 2030 goal to reduce smoking from 14% of the adult population in 2018 to 5% by 2030. According to study authors, reaching this goal through tobacco control efforts at the national, state, and local levels would considerably reduce the economic loss attributable to smoking.
“The Healthy People 2030 goal provides an important target that will help reduce smoking and correspondingly the negative economic impact of tobacco use,” said Nargis. “In addition, hitting this target will help divert scarce resources away from treating tobacco-related illnesses towards growing market productivity and household income.”
“The damage this industry causes on individuals’ lives and our nation’s economy is horrifying,” said Lisa Lacasse, president of the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network (ACS CAN). “It’s particularly alarming, but not surprising, to see some of the states with the highest economic loss have the weakest tobacco control policies in place. We know what works to reduce tobacco use and lessen this burden and it’s past time we get it done. Passing policies proven to reduce tobacco use including regular and significant tobacco tax increases, adequate funding for tobacco prevention and cessation programs and comprehensive smoke-free laws has a huge impact on reducing tobacco-related diseases like cancer and addressing the financial burden this product poses on state economies and the nation.”
Dr. Ahmedin Jemal is senior author of the study. Other ACS authors include: Dr. Samuel Asare, Zheng Xue, Dr. Anuja Majmundar, Dr. Priti Bandi, Dr. Farhad Islami, and Dr. Robin Yabroff.
Resources from the ACS on quitting smoking can be found here.
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About the American Cancer Society The American Cancer Society is on a mission to free the world from cancer. We invest in lifesaving research, provide 24/7 information and support, and work to ensure that individuals in every community have access to cancer prevention, detection, and treatment. For more information, visit cancer.org.
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American Cancer Society (ACS)
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Great Tobacco Substitute: Genmist by Nioo Labs – the Most Popular Herbal Heatsticks in Europe by Customer Review
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BEIJING, September 15, 2021 (Newswire.com)
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Genmist currently has eight different herbal heatstick flavors and is selling around the whole of Europe. According to 500 local customers’ sample feedbacks, Genmist is the most popular herbal smoking product in Europe, especially the blueberry flavor.Genmist herbal heatstick was developed by Nioo Labs, the world’s leading research lab which is devoted to innovating the latest 100% tobacco-free products. Genmist herbal heatsticks are tobacco-free and tar-free. It is an alternative for adult smokers who intend to quit tobacco but still want to enjoy the real tobacco taste and nicotine hit as well as the satisfaction of smoking without the smoke or ash of cigarettes. It is composed of a mixture of various herbs and other plant materials.
Genmist heatstick is a heat (not burn) product, consisting of Gen particles (the company’s herbal particles), filter tip and food-grade silicon cooler, wrapped with food-grade paper.
Genmist by Nioo Labs has launched two products lines: Nicotine Pouches and Herbal Heatsticks. Genmist nicotine pouches have been named the Top 3 best nicotine pouches in 2021 by BreezyScroll. Genmist by Nioo Labs is backed by Hangsen International Group. This cooperation is based on the consensus that both companies believe that 100% tobacco-free is the future.
With the help of Hangsen, Genmist products will expand rapidly through Hangsen’s sales channel around the world and the manufacturing capacity will not become a concern.
Source: Genmist
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Genmist – a New Tobacco Free Advocate
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Press Release
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updated: Jun 27, 2021
BEIJING, June 27, 2021 (Newswire.com)
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Since the emerge of vaping products from 10 years ago, the world sees a continuous decline of cigarette consumptions year on year. This is a positive sign that vaping is helping smokers move to alternative ways of taking in nicotine. Since NRT (nicotine replacement therapy) was advocated by WHO in 1978 we start to see it taking effects in mass cloud among smokers.The huge success of vaping ignites the passion of global tobacco companies in the technology and future of NGP (New Generation Product), Phillip Morris (Parent company of the world famous Marlboro brand cigarette), BAT (Parent company of Camel), Japan Tobacco, Imperial Tobacco and so on, all invest heavily in the development and marketing of the new products. Phillip Morris has moved all its marketing budget from combustible cigarettes to IQOS, its new heat not burn product.
In addition to big tobacco, there are also many new companies globally who are passionate about this revolution in smoking, especially in USA and China, the two biggest markets for vaping. We have seen flourishing development of new vaping products, such as bigger disposable, disposable with lights, pod devices with screen and so on. However, there is a lot less development in other product categories. In the electronic-cigarette industry, there are many new companies are making efforts for the development of the industry. As we all know, quitting tobacco is not a one-step thing, so in order to make our future smokeless and tobacco-free, the world needs to build a user-friendly platform with the latest technology and innovation at this stage. “We are doing which not many new companies do,” said Shelley Wu, the Co-founder of the Genmist brand which has heat not burn and nicotine pouch products. They thrive to create quit-tobacco products.
It is known that Genmist products are all tobacco-free nicotine products, including tobacco free heat sticks used with heat not burn device, and tobacco free natural nicotine pouches. With all the efforts of Vaping industry that the idea of tobacco free is widely welcome by consumers and Genmist is now sold in over 10 countries. Their consumers are not only smokers, there are a lot of snus and chewing tobacco users who use Genmist nicotine pouches to replace their old tobacco products.
It is known that smoking kills 7 millions individuals every year and people are seeing vaping, heat not burn, tobacco free products and even newer products are reshaping the ways people take in nicotine. Smoking is still the most common way to take in nicotine but the fact is that the trend is shifting. The question is that will big tobacco still be the only players in this new game, or companies like Genmist will continue to gain its global popularity to provide the world a better solution? Only time will tell.
Source: Genmist
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Juul seeks authorization on a new vape it says can verify a user’s age. Here’s how it works | CNN Business
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CNN
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E-cigarette company Juul Labs is seeking US authorization to sell a “next-generation” vape with age verification capabilities in the United States.
To verify a user’s age, the proposed vape pairs with a phone app, requiring a customer to either upload their government ID and a real-time selfie or input personal information and allow a third-party database to verify their identity, according to a Juul spokesperson.
A unique Pod ID chip within the Juul device can also detect counterfeit cartridges made by other companies, many of which have flooded the market with illegal fruity flavors that appeal to minors.
The mission of the new platform is twofold, according to the company: Encourage adult smokers to switch from combustible cigarettes to e-cigarettes while restricting underage access.
The legal age to purchase e-cigarettes in the United States is 21.
“We look forward to engaging with FDA throughout the review process while we pursue this important harm-reduction opportunity,” Juul’s Chief Regulatory Officer Joe Murillo said in a company news release.
If authorized by the US Food and Drug Administration, Juul Labs hasn’t yet decided on the name to market their new product in the US. In the UK and Canada, where it’s already for sale, it’s called the JUUL2.
Advertising itself as an alternative nicotine product, Juul publicly advises that adults vape only as a replacement for combustible cigarettes.
But Juul has a troubled history in US markets.
“They were the spark that ignited the flame,” said Robin Koval, CEO of the nonprofit Truth Initiative, organizers of the nation’s largest campaign for youth to quit vaping. “This is not a company known to tell the truth.”
Juul Labs has settled more than 5,000 cases brought by approximately 10,000 plaintiffs since its vaping devices initially skyrocketed in popularity in 2016, with some alleging the company deceived or failed to warn consumers about the risks of its products. The e-cigarette maker also agreed to pay $462 million to six US states and Washington, DC, in April after a lawsuit accused Juul Labs of directly promoting its products to high school students. In total, Juul Labs has agreed to pay more than $1 billion in its various legal settlements.
Juul dominated over 70% of the US e-cigarette market at its peak in late 2018. In the same year, 27% of high school students and 7.2% of middle school students said they used tobacco for one or more days in the month, according to the 2018 National Youth Tobacco Survey.
Juul is now a less favored brand among youth. When asked what e-cigarette brands they used in the past 30 days, youth e-cigarette users in the 2022 National Youth Tobacco Survey answered Puff Bar most frequently (29.7%), followed by Vuse (23.6%) and then Juul (22%), with the first two being disposable vaping products.
In 2019, Juul suspended all flavors other than tobacco and menthol and suspended broadcast, digital and print publication marketing.
Even with limited flavors, the FDA banned Juul products in the US last year after reviewing Juul’s applications seeking marketing authorization for their devices. The FDA determined that the applications lacked “sufficient evidence” within the toxicological profile of the vaporizers to prove that marketing the products would be in the interest of public health.
The FDA has placed the ban on hold while Juul Labs appeals.
Juul Labs submitted its most recent application to the FDA on July 19, as all e-cigarette manufacturers are required to do before their product can be marketed and sold legally in the United States. This first filing concerns just one flavor, Virginia Tobacco, with a nicotine concentration of 18 mg per mL.
Although Juul’s new platform has age verification capabilities, the company does not intend to lock all their new pods before use. For example, the Virginia Tobacco pods will not come automatically locked. The spokesperson for Juul said doing so could create “friction” for the adult smokers the tobacco flavor is most likely to target.
“If you’re an adult smoker and you go to buy a cigarette, it’s pretty easy to use the product,” a Juul spokesperson told CNN. “If you add in another barrier before product use, that creates some level of friction.”
Using the new Pod ID feature, Juul’s new vaping device could tell a Virginia Tobacco pod apart from a menthol-flavored pod. It could then require age verification to activate only the latter, according to the spokesperson.
Juul has researched other flavors that combine tobacco and menthol with fruity tones to potentially submit to the FDA following this filing. Juul currently sells the flavor Autumn Tobacco in the UK, which contains “tangy apple notes,” according to its website.
Just because e-cigarette companies are required to comply with the FDA doesn’t mean all of them do. In fact, most don’t. To date, the FDA has authorized only 23 specific e-cigarette products, all of which are tobacco flavored.
Yet more than 2.5 million US middle and high school students said they use e-cigarettes as of last year, according to the 2022 National Youth Tobacco Survey. Almost 85% consume fruity, candy or other flavored products, despite them being illegal.
Koval of Truth Initiative said the tobacco industry “floods the market” with products such that the FDA can’t keep up.
“It is a little bit like Whac-a-Mole for the FDA and for those of us who are trying to promote healthier behaviors for young people,” Koval said. The total number of e-cigarette brands increased by 46.2% between January 2020 and December 2022, from 184 to 269, according to a study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
To gain FDA authorization for its latest platform, Juul must prove to the FDA that in aiding the public health crisis of adult smoking, it is not further exacerbating the spread of youth vaping.
“This is only the beginning of new tech being developed and refined for the US market and abroad to eliminate combustible cigarettes and combat underage use,” Juul’s Chief Product Officer Kirk Phelps said.
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Will Asvape Michael Box Mod Be the New Age Queen?
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Press Release
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updated: Jul 25, 2017
GuangDong Province, China, July 25, 2017 (Newswire.com)
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As Asvape Michael Box Mod goes on sale on ave40.com globally, new research coming from the peer-reviewed Annals of Internal Medicine says that vaping is “far safer than smoking,” and not just an effective smoking cessation technique.In addition, a new survey, which claims that more than half of British vapers have stopped smoking tobacco, seemingly points to the usefulness of vaping as a viable technique to quit smoking. The survey was conducted by Action on Smoking and Health (Ash).
To commemorate those findings, AVE40 is urging smokers to take advantage of its products and transition to vaping, which is not only safer for them, but for their families and the world in general. Another recent study, by the Royal College of Physicians states that while vaping is more harmful than Nicotine Replacement Therapy, “the hazard to health arising from long-term vapor inhalation from the e-cigarettes available today is unlikely to exceed 5 percent of the harm from smoking tobacco.”
The good news is that according to a study published in Environmental Science & Technology, those who vape at well-regulated temperatures are much less at risk than those vaping at extremely high temperatures (“A Hotter Vape Emits Higher Levels of Carcinogens, Study Shows” – Vice.com). According to the report, when vaping at high temperatures, a compound known as propylene glycol degrades to formaldehyde, which is a well-known carcinogen. Vapers then inhale the contaminated vapor.
AVE40‘s CEO welcomed the findings of the report, saying “It did not negatively change the ways consumers view its products. In fact, none of its consumers prefer the bitter and burnt taste produced when vaping is done at extremely high temperatures. There are currently no other studies that have been commissioned to find the benefits of vaping.”
Researchers stumbled upon the current benefits because the goal of the studies was to find out if vaping was harmful in any way to its consumers or the public. Since vaping only became popular in the mid-2000s, researchers don’t have enough data to help them understand the long term effects of vaping. Hopefully, researchers will discover more vaping benefits on the human body as data becomes available.
Why is vaping safer than smoking? While launching the new Asvape Michael Box Mod design, AVE40 CEO explained how smoking differs from vaping. He said, “Smoking involves combusting tobacco along with 4,000 other ingredients. Once these ingredients start to burn, they emit smoke, which is then inhaled by the user. However, since not all smoke is inhaled, the rest of the smoke becomes available for ‘secondary smokers’ to involuntarily inhale.”
Furthermore, some of the inhaled smoke is exhaled, adding to the volume of secondhand smoke. Overall, the cigarette combustion creates harmful compounds known as carcinogens, which are present in the emitted smoke. That’s where vaping beats smoking, at least in most cases. You have to say in most cases because not all vaporizers are capable of heating their e-liquid without combusting it.
However, once the combusting is eliminated, vaping becomes much safer than smoking. That’s because, instead of smoke, vapers inhale vapor or steam. That’s much safer than the tar and other complex compounds that smokers have to inhale. While vaping is safer, most people are not aware of that fact. They see the vapor and think it to be smoke, which has led to vaping being banned much the same way as cigarettes.
The government has subjected cigarettes to bans ever since they became popular. First, the government banned it in hospitals, then in planes, and then it banned smoking in government offices. Now they are banned in public spaces. For smokers, that means needing to find a designated place to smoke or waiting till they get home. With the general aversion to smoking, anything that resembles smoking gets the same treatment, even when it’s been proven to be much less harmful.
As AVE40 launches its newest product, it hopes for the best as people get to learn that vaping is much safer than smoking. AVE40 believes that as more data becomes available, the public will easily distinguish it from smoking. For now, AVE40 is pleased with the success of the Asvape Michael brand. It has been a huge success among its vape mods and AVE40 attributes its success to its long lasting vape batteries as well as its functional design.
The new Asvape Michael Box Mod combines functionality, style, and precision heating to deliver the best vaping experience. Consumers will enjoy its safety features, which prevents combusting of the e-liquid, heating of the batteries, as well as preserving battery life. AVE40 designed this particular vape mod to fit nicely in one hand and look like an artistic masterpiece. In doing so, they made Asvape Michael Box Mod not just a recreational device, but also a symbol of class.
About AVE40
AVE40 is connected with Alibaba. Established in 2013, AVE40 grows with an 80-person team for business development and services. Passionate and energetic, the team offers a wide array of vapor products with their considerate services. In 2016, AVE40 tops its sales volume of over $75 million US Dollars. AVE40 covers over 1,000 vapor shops and major online stores in China, taking 80 percent of the domestic customer groups.Press Contact
info@ave40.comSource: ave40
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