The “Progress” of Prohibition. CASAA in Action. Public health lies about harm reduction. FDA’s “whack-a-mole.” Vape bans turn deadly. Australia’s “Special Kind of Stupid.” Vaping Baptists and Bootleggers. Calls to Action and more!
Scroll to the bottom of this post for a link to the audio/video versions of this post!
CALL TO ACTION // Louisiana Flavor Ban!
HB 179 was reported out of the H&W committee with an amendment deleting the exemption for mint & menthol vapes. You can still buy menthol cigarettes, but it’s a BIG NO to switching to safer minty vapes!
TAKE ACTION: Louisiana – Stop a Flavor Ban
CALL TO ACTION // Maine Flavor Ban!
LD 1215 would put many adult lives back at risk by banning tobacco and nicotine products in any flavor (even “cooling”) other than “tobacco.”
A second hearing was held on May 18th!
READ MORE: Maine – Stop a Flavor Ban!
UPDATE! CALL TO ACTION // Nebraska Vape Tax!
An amendment to LB 727 by Senator Linehan would impose a 10% retail tax for vapor products containing more than 3 mL of liquid and a 5c/mL tax for products containing less than 3 mL!
TAKE ACTION: Nebraska – Stop a Vape Tax!
TOBACCO HARM REDUCTION // The “Progress” of Prohibition
History shows us that banning drugs always leads to other drugs filling the demand, and the new drugs are frequently more dangerous than what they replaced.
So, what do they think will happen when they ban the low risk nicotine products that are replacing deadly cigarettes?
TOBACCO HARM REDUCTION // Harm Reduction Should Be For Everyone
Hopefully this also means Governor Scott will reject anti-harm reduction legislation such as Vermont Bill S.18, which would bar access to thousands of affordable, appealing and very low risk products that are saving the lives of millions of adults who consume nicotine and tobacco.
Congrats, Vermont! @GovPhilScott just signed a bill that expands harm reduction services and enacts one of the most far-reaching drug checking laws in the country. We are proud to have worked with @DecrimVermont to make this win possible. It's a leap forward in replacing… pic.twitter.com/GD0XDNCdqq
— Drug Policy Alliance (@DrugPolicyOrg) May 26, 2023
READ MORE: Phil Scott signs overdose prevention legislation into law
CALL TO ACTION: Vermont – Stop a Flavor Ban!
TOBACCO HARM REDUCTION // EU Should Support Tobacco Harm Reduction
Is the campaign to stop people smoking cigarettes being held back by an impulse to ban all tobacco [and nicotine] products? The evidence suggests that nicotine-based alternatives to smoking, such as e-cigarettes have an important part to play, writes Political Editor Nick Powell.
"After similar … products to Sweden’s snus were introduced in Japan in 2014, there was an unprecedented decline in adults smoking cigarettes over the next 5 years. In Singapore, where smoke-free alternatives are banned, sales of cigarettes have gone up" https://t.co/LdNrcsgabd
— Martin C (@NannyFreeState) May 31, 2023
READ MORE: HEALTHIgnoring the evidence: Is ‘conventional wisdom’ hindering the fight against smoking?
CASAA IN ACTION // LGBTQ+ Community Deserves the Truth About Vaping
CASAA CEO Alex Clark didn’t mince words in this Washington Examiner article:
“A $2.2 million grant to test the effectiveness of lying to marginalized young people is clearly a step in the wrong direction and risks further harming at-risk youth,” Alex Clark, CEO of the Consumer Advocates for Smoke-free Alternatives Association, an advocacy group supporting “reduced-harm alternatives to smoking,” told the Washington Examiner.
“While vaping isn’t risk-free, which is an unreasonable bar for any consumer product, it and other smoke-free options are proving to be a more popular and effective exit strategy from smoking than approved therapies,” Clark added. “Just because a person identifies as LGBTQ+ doesn’t justify lying to them about products that can improve or save their lives.”
@Hello_Alex from @CASAAmedia has also some hard hitting🥊 quotes in the @washexaminer article on the tax money waste programs, garnered to spread lies against #safernicotine amongst LGBTQ+ 🏳️🌈 people who are disproportionately more effected by harms from #combustibletobacco. https://t.co/TTWaNHO6Nz
— 💨Dave 🇩🇪❤️🇺🇦🐶 (@bk13051) May 29, 2023
READ MORE: Biden HHS spends millions on ‘anti-vaping’ social media campaign for LGBT youth
CASAA IN ACTION // CASAA Live Clip
Guest Prof. Gerry Stimson on the World Health Organization opposition of THR and how that influences low- and middle-income countries.
Catch a new CASAA Live episode this Saturday at 4:30 PM EDT/3:30 PM CDT!
FULL EPISODE: CASAA Live | Hope for Harm Reduction with Gerry Stimson
TOBACCO CONTROL // Public Health Lies
Mississippi Department of Health lies about low risk vaping, falsely stating that “vaping is not safer,” that it will “will contribute to hypertension” and that it’s “an epidemic,” because more people vape than use cigars, hookahs & chewables (but, of course, they omit the fact that far more people still smoke deadly cigarettes than vape.)
Smokers with hypertension (high blood pressure), who switch to nicotine vapes ("e-cigarettes") have significantly "improved blood pressure control."https://t.co/95dSDrY06M pic.twitter.com/7AVSM14BTV
— Charles A. Gardner, PhD (@ChaunceyGardner) August 10, 2021
READ MORE: E-cigarettes are linked to hypertension, and nicotine is the culprit
TOBACCO CONTROL // It’s No Longer About Saving Lives?
What happened to you, Tobacco Control? You started out trying to save people from dying from SMOKING. Now you have such zealous hatred of anything with NICOTINE that you celebrate banning safer products that are…saving people from dying from smoking?
#WorldNoTobaccoDay #Vaping
Today’s @FDATobacco action is an important step toward clearing the market of flavored e-cigs popular with kids. To end this crisis, FDA must deny marketing applications for ALL flavored e-cigs. As long as any are for sale, kids will migrate to them. https://t.co/4NcMfSUK3H
— Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids (@TobaccoFreeKids) May 25, 2023
TOBACCO CONTROL // FDA’s “Whack-A-Mole”
The FDA continues to play “whack-a-mole” with disposable vapes, pretending that is somehow “protecting our nation’s youth from tobacco products,” while also seemingly under the delusion that 20 others won’t pop up to replace whatever they whack down.
More FDA Disposable Enforcement: Hyde and Puff Bar Sellers Targeted.
By Jim McDonaldhttps://t.co/tWIRcYZCmE— Vaping360 (@Vaping360) June 2, 2023
COMMENTARY // Flavor Ban Backfire
I walked past three…stores in hopes of picking up a disposable vape during a particularly tense afternoon. Thanks to these ridiculous flavor bans, I couldn’t get one anywhere in the city. I didn’t have any trouble finding a pack of Marlboro Red 100’s, though, so that’s what I got. I wonder how many of the Maine kids the legislature is trying to save will do the same.”
READ MORE: Unpacking the Sausage: Flavortown vs. Big Tobacco
COMMENTARY // Australia’s “Special Kind of Stupid”
It takes a special kind of stupid to engineer a situation in which you have high rates of both smoking and vaping among teenagers, but Australia has somehow managed it.”
~ Christopher Snowdon
READ MORE: Australia: a special kind of stupid
TOBACCO CONTROL // Baptists & Bootleggers
Baptists and Bootleggers: When normally opposing interests both support regulation because one gets the moral high ground and the other profits. In this case, Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids and tobacco giant Reynolds both claim the moral high ground and both will benefit financially.
Consumers, on the other hand, just lose access to life-saving products.🤷♀️
Reynolds applauds @DrCaliff_FDA’s commitment to protecting the nation’s youth from illegal disposables and @FDA’s increased efforts to hold “all players in the supply chain” accountable to the law. #FinishTheJob and get ALL illegal disposable products off the shelves. https://t.co/Nm9LdlxUGi
— Reynolds American Inc. (@RAI_News) May 31, 2023
Today’s @FDATobacco action is an important step toward clearing the market of flavored e-cigs popular with kids. To end this crisis, FDA must deny marketing applications for ALL flavored e-cigs. As long as any are for sale, kids will migrate to them. https://t.co/4NcMfSUK3H
— Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids (@TobaccoFreeKids) May 25, 2023
TOBACCO CONTROL // Taking Credit Where Credit Isn’t Due?
New York Department of Health credits historically ineffective Tobacco Control policies for reducing smoking and vaping, including a flavor ban that they claim reduced vaping because…vapor product tax revenues have declined. They don’t mention the huge illicit tobacco and vape market in New York or that significant declines were also seen in states that DIDN’T ban flavors.🤔
"We are very successful.
Because we told ourselves so!" pic.twitter.com/2ZQuIzf8UY— 💨Dave 🇩🇪❤️🇺🇦🐶 (@bk13051) June 2, 2023
TOBACCO CONTROL // Unintended Yet Predictable Consequences
Tobacco Harm Reduction Advocates: “These bans will grow the illicit market, causing potentially deadly interactions with law enforcement, especially in low income and minority communities.”
Anti-Vaping Groups: “Nonsense. These bans will only protect teens from a predatory industry!”
News Report: “Aurora Police said Jor’Dell Richardson, 14, died in the shooting involving officers after a group of teens stole vape canisters from a convenience store.”
"Aurora Police said Jor'Dell Richardson, 14, died in the shooting involving officers after a group of teens stole vape canisters from a convenience store."
We tried to warn them, but they just called us "shills." https://t.co/edv31l05KZ
— Kristin Noll-Marsh (@Noll_Marsh) June 2, 2023
READ MORE: Teen robbery suspect ID’d who was killed in shooting with Aurora officers
RESEARCH // Um…‘Vapers’ Don’t Smoke
The headline suggests that vaping, separate from smoking, is “linked to symptom burden in cancer” survivors. However, buried in the Discussion section of the actual study was this: “Given the small number of current e-cigarette users, our analyses included all current e-cigarette users regardless of current combustible tobacco use.” So how many of those people that they wrongly categorized as “current e-cigarette users” still smoked? Over 64%.🤦♂️
READ MORE: Current Smoking, Vaping Linked to Symptom Burden in Cancer
MEDIA MISINFORMATION // Dentist Website Lies About Vaping Risks
It is absolutely NOT TRUE that “all forms of tobacco are equally harmful to health.” Experts acknowledge there is a “continuum of risk,” with snus being relatively safe. This kind of misinformation is why people now think they may as well keep smoking.
There is a continuum of risk. pic.twitter.com/IMxJgYj3UT
— Dale Staten – Every day 1300 🇺🇸 die from 🚬 (@Dstat_THR) May 24, 2023
READ MORE: Smoking is a Risk to Oral Health – All Forms of Tobacco Are Equally Harmful
CASAA TESTIMONIAL PROJECT
Anecdote #13,521:
After smoking for 48 years, Dee Dee was finally able to quit with a vanilla flavored vape. If she hadn’t had the opportunity to try MANY flavors to find “the ONE” that worked for her, she would still be smoking!
Share YOUR story at the link below!
Submit Your Testimonial: CASAA Testimonial Project
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 (@CASAAmedia) October 26, 2022
CASAA IN ACTION // CASAA Live
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!
On this last episode, join CASAA CEO Alex Clark and CASAA Member Coordinator Kristin Noll-Marsh with guest Professor Gerry Stimson to discuss his great Filter Magazine article, “Why I’m Still Fiercely Optimistic About Tobacco Harm Reduction.” You’ll hear about his involvement with the Global Forum on Nicotine, the importance of the inclusion of consumer perceptions and experiences in discussions, and find out why he’s still optimistic about Tobacco Harm Reduction!
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: