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Looming Vaping Flavor Bans and More! Tobacco Harm Reduction News

Three states moving towards banning flavored vaping and other low risk products. Politics of attacking people who smoke. CASAA President Danielle Jones in Filter Magazine. Research on anti-vaping policies. Take the 2022 Consumer Survey. FDA fail and more!

Scroll to the bottom of this post for a link to the audio/video versions of this post!


HEADS UP! // NEW YORK

Gov. Kathy Hochul has announced that she wants to ban the sale of flavored tobacco products in NY. Flavored vapor products are already banned in NY, so this would further reduce adult access to far less harmful smoking alternatives.

READ MORE: NY State of the State 2023: Hochul eyes cigarette tax hike

HEADS UP! // INDIANA

A bill introduced by state Rep. Carolyn Jackson seeks to deprive adults over 21 of the flavored vapor products that help them keep from smoking and which could potentially help the 19.4% of adults in the state who still smoke to quit.

READ MORE: Read Text: House Bill 1133

HEADS UP! // MAINE

State Senator Jill Duson has filed a bill seeking to ban the sale of flavored tobacco/vapor products statewide. The State Legislature has already begun its session, but the bill has not yet been assigned to a committee.

READ MORE: https://halfwheel.com/maine-legislator-introduces-bill-to-ban-flavored-tobacco-sales-statewide/417481/


ADVOCACY // 2022 eCigIntelligence Consumer Survey

Please take the 2022 survey!

The data collected from this 10-15 minute, anonymous survey will help inform regulators, advocates, and commentators as we all work to build policies that benefit consumers!

SURVEY LINK: USA – Vape Consumer Survey 2022

TOBACCO HARM REDUCTION // Politics of Attacking People Who Smoke

No, smoking isn’t “back” on Capitol Hill, but it sure seems like some folks thought that was the perfect way to vilify their opposition.  Nothing is worse than people who smoke, right? Kind of explains the anti-harm reduction attitude of “quit or die.”

READ MORE: FAKE NEWS ALERT: Indoor Smoking Is Still Banned in the Capitol (But It Shouldn’t Be)

CASAA IN ACTION // CASAA President Danielle Jones in Filter Magazine

“Instead of trying to invent new terms to distance themselves from tobacco companies,” CASAA president Jones told Filter Magazine, the creators of the video “should focus on learning the language that exists from people who use the products.”

READ MORE: Johns Hopkins Call for Nicotine “Common Language” Falls Flat

TOBACCO CONTROL // Denying Safer Alternatives

Wisconsin cigarette sales have dropped 54% since 2001 and sales outlets report that adults are choosing far less harmful alternatives to smoking–such as vapor products and nicotine pouches–but PHMDC’s Morgan Finke falsely claims those could be “even more detrimental to health” because of the nicotine levels and “nicotine in any capacity is proven to damage the adolescent brain.”

READ MORE: Cigarette sales in Wis. plummet but alternative smoking methods compensate

TOBACCO CONTROL // Missed Opportunity

California lawmakers had an opportunity to encourage tobacco companies to transition to selling low risk nicotine products like vapor products, snus and nicotine pouches. Instead, they passed a law that encouraged this: Camel and Newport items are billed as newly “fresh” or “crisp” non-menthol versions.

READ MORE: R.J. Reynolds Pivots to New Cigarette Pitches as Flavor Ban Takes Effect

TOBACCO CONTROL // Prohibition Redeux

“Instead of addressing the core concern of youth e-cigarette use, this proposed rule only stands to pull the rug out from under more than 30 million adults, forcing them to essentially quit smoking cold turkey or — much like during Prohibition — get their fix through illicit markets. ”

READ MORE: Biden’s expected nicotine rule brings failed 1920s Prohibition to 2023

TOBACCO CONTROL // New York Health Department Tilting at Windmills

The New York State Department of Health is urging all New Yorkers who use electronic cigarette (e-cigarettes) and other vapor devices to make a New Year’s resolution to quit using these “highly addictive and dangerous products,” while 1.7 million adults in NY still smoke cigarettes and would benefit greatly from switching to much lower risk vaping.

READ MORE: DOH message to vapers and e-cig users: Resolve to quit in the new year

TOBACCO CONTROL // Moving the Goalposts

What constitutes a “kid-friendly flavor”? As Clive Bates has pointed out, as of 2017, this label was attached to candy store or ice cream shop ENDS flavors, or silly ones like “Unicorn Puke.” Removing them from the market would still leave many options for adults who smoked. But today, by definition, all ENDS flavors—other than “tobacco,” and including menthol—attract kids. This is a classic case of moving the goalposts to achieve a win.”

~ Dr. Cheryl K. Olson

READ MORE: Science-based Regulation?

TOBACCO CONTROL // Consequences of Nannyism

How it started:

“There’s strong evidence that increasing taxes on things people want will make them not want it anymore.”

How it’s going:

“30% to 50% of tobacco sales in B.C. are contraband products.”

READ MORE: Contraband tobacco inhales 30 to 50 per cent of B.C. market, retailers, industry fear

LEGISLATION // DeWine Supports Flavor Ban

After vetoing a bill that would have prevented municipalities from passing tobacco/nicotine laws stricter than state law, Gov. DeWine suggests lawmakers pursue a statewide ban on flavored tobacco (but the real target is usually low risk vapor products.)

READ MORE: Gov. Mike DeWine vetoes flavored tobacco ban bill, signals support for statewide ban

FDA // No Strategy, No Plan, No Goals

The FDA “CTP has failed its mission at every juncture. Sometimes the center’s failures were caused by incompetence, and sometimes the regulators acted because of outside influence, but mostly the CTP’s actions have been deliberate…”

READ MORE: Report: FDA Tobacco Center Has No Strategy, No Plan, No Goals

RESEARCH // Another Retracted Vape Study

Retracted study “features enough inconsistencies, writing errors, non sequiturs, and failures of reasoning to make you wonder whether peer reviewers and editors actually read it, let alone carefully evaluated its strengths and weaknesses.”

~Jacob Sullum, Reason Magazine

READ MORE: A Medical Journal Retracts a 2022 Study That Linked Vaping to Cancer

RESEARCH // An Analysis of Bad Vaping Science by Clive Bates

Major U.S. research funders are aiming for a “world free of tobacco use,” which also means free of nicotine use. Tobacco regulatory science funded by regulators will be inclined to find justifications for regulation and intervention, not liberalization.

READ MORE: Bad Science

RESEARCH // Policy Backfire

Newly published research by Sam Safford at MSU shows policies designed to reduce youth vaping–that prioritize reducing nicotine use over reducing smoking–may actually be “pushing teens back to significantly more harmful traditional tobacco cigarettes.”

READ MORE: https://sociology.msu.edu/news/safford-ends.html

RESEARCH // The Harm of Misinformation

Put simply, what this Cornell study found is–due to rampant misinformation and wishy-washy statements from public health and CDC about the health benefits of switching from smoking to e-cigarettes–the public believes vaping is as risky as smoking.

READ MORE: Challenges in communicating the benefits of switching from cigarettes to e-cigarettes: Responses from eight adult focus groups with varying smoking experience

 


CASAA MEDIA // Spotify

CASAA’s podcast is on Spotify! Please give us a follow here:

CASAA IN ACTION // Twitter Spaces

The week we recap the Reagan-Udall sessions with Amanda Wheeler, Tim Andrews and CASAA CEO Alex Clark, who all presented to the panel about FDA’s issues regulating reduced-harm products. What grade would you give FDA? Also available on CASAA’s Spotify channel (above.)

CASAA IN ACTION // CASAA Live

If you missed the most recent CASAA Live show, check out the replay now! CASAA Live is on alternating Saturdays at 4:30 PM ET/3:30 PM CT/2:30 PM MT/1:30 PM PT on Facebook, YouTube and Twitter!

If you missed the last CASAA Live episode you can catch up NOW before the next show!

TAKE ACTION // CASAA State Facebook Groups

Have you joined your CASAA State Facebook group yet? Check it out now! Click the link below, click on your state on the map, then click the “Join Now” button to go to your state’s group page. It’s as easy as that to stay updated on local happenings, meet local advocates and never miss a Call to Action in your state!

Don’t forget to also follow our official Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/CASAAmedia

FIND YOUR GROUP: CASAA State Locator

CASAA STORE // Apparel and More

Show your support by shopping our store! Our president (and brilliant website/swag designer) Danielle has added some awesome new designs to CASAA’s apparel shop!

 

VISIT: CASAA Apparel and Swag Store

CASAA MEDIA // Podcast

Catch up on past tobacco harm reduction news with Alex and Logan on the CASAA podcasts on SoundCloud every Monday and now live on YouTube and Facebook every Saturday at 3:30 PM.

SoundCloud:

 

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