Category Archives: Vaping

Hulu and FX collab The New York Times Presentshas delivered some top-notch documentary content this year; from award-winning investigative installmentThe Killing of Breonna Taylor andheadline-making Framing Britney Spearsto eye-opening examinations likeThe Teenager Who Hacked TwitterandWho Gets to Be An Influencer?, the series has never shied away from diving deep into a variety of subjects.Move Fast & Vape Things, now streaming on Hulu, chronicles the rise and fall of e-cigarette maker Juul.

The Gist: What if there was a way to eradicate cigarettes? To stop losing loved ones to lung cancer caused by smoking? Youd want to be a part of that, right? Thats exactly what James Monsees and Adam Bowen dreamed about when they devised the idea for Juul (then Plume), a compact e-cigarette they hoped would help adult smokers quit combustible cigarettes. What began as a well-intentioned Stanford project soon became a buzzy Silicon Valley startup that reached farther than anyone could have anticipated. With its fruity flavors and sleek design, Juul appealed to not only adult smokers and millennials, but high schoolers and middle schoolers, too. And thats where the trouble begins.

With the help of former employees, FDA officials, journalists, and a young woman whose life was dramatically impacted by getting addicted when she was only a sophomore in high school, Move Fast & Vape Thingstells the story of how a company with good intentions became swallowed up by greed and arrogance. Some 3 million children in the United States use e-cigarettes, and that is largely in part due to the rate Juul spread throughout high school and middle school populations thats a 78% and 48% increase in just a year, respectively. Today, Juul has effectively stepped away from their original mission, one that included standing up to Big Tobacco (Marlboro parent company Altria now owns a large chunk of the company), and some 2,000 lawsuits have been filed against Juul for their role in the youth e-cigarette epidemic.Move Fast & Vape Thingsexamines just how quickly good intentions can be vaporized.

What Movies Will It Remind You Of?:Move Fast & Vape Thingswill likely remind you of other installments ofThe New York Times Presents, and it may also bring to mind the films of Alex Gibney (includingThe Inventor: Out for Blood in Silicon ValleyandThe Crime of the Century), as well as the Netflix series Dirty Money.

Performance Worth Watching: I was deeply moved by Jackie, the teenager who became addicted to vaping and now is suffering long-term health consequences as a result. Its gutting to watch her recount her story and how the Juul took over her life, consuming her during school hours and dominating her social life. Its impossible not to get misty towards the end of the doc when she says she used to feel bad that her parents had to know her, but now has formed an incredibly close relationship with them since quitting nicotine. Jackie and her mother really bring a lot of heart to Move Fast & Vape Things.

Memorable Dialogue: Ryan Woodring, a former marketing director from Juul, offers some of the best insight in the film. Watching him realize that what hes doing doesnt align with his ethics anymore is one of the standout moments in the doc: Am I dumb? Are we a dumb company? Or even worse, oh, shit, are we an evil company? If those are my options, I dont like either of them.

Sex and Skin: None.

Our Take:Clocking in at just around an hour long, its pretty breathtaking (no pun intended) just how muchMove Fast & Vape Thingsis able to pack in without things feeling rushed.The New York Times Presentshas been willing to ask all kinds of questions (even the uncomfortable ones) in its various installments thus far, andMove Fast & Vape Thingsis no exception; we get to see who benefited from Juuls rapid rise, who has profound regret about their role in it all, and whose lives have been dramatically impacted by the effects of these e-cigarettes.

By including stories equal parts political, emotional, and ethical,Move Fast & Vape Thingsdoes something uniquely interesting. We get a glimpse of the e-cigarette industry as a whole and the history of devices like these, were able to fully grasp the good intentions of two young men who wanted to see smoking change, and were able to see the more interpersonal picture of what childhood addiction can do to an individual (and to a family). Its great storytelling, one that will likely make you angry and aghast.

The filmmakers have assembled a great cast of talking heads, from the aforementioned Jackie Franklin and her family and former marketing director Ryan Woodring to New York Times journalists and former FDA commissioner Scott Gottlieb. All of these perspectives make for a well-rounded examination of a crisis still in full swing, one that feels unresolved by the end but is wholly compelling all the same. There couldnt be a better time for these kinds of accessible, investigative stories, andThe New York Times Presentscontinues to knock it out of the park with each unique installment.

Our Call:STREAM IT.The New York Times Presentsdelivers another winner withMove Fast & Vape Things, a fascinating examination of how good intentions can go up in smoke (or vapor).

Jade Budowski is a freelance writer with a knack for ruining punchlines, hogging the mic at karaoke, and thirst-tweeting. Follow her on Twitter: @jadebudowski.

StreamMove Fast & Vape Thingson Hulu

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Stream It Or Skip It: 'Move Fast & Vape Things' On Hulu, A Documentary About The Rapid Rise And Collapse of Juul - Decider

Substantial savings on your resistance coil budget

One of the easiest money-saving tips consists of making your own resistance coils. Indeed, the resistance coils that generally go with clearomizers can easily cost between 1$ and 4$ per unit. Given that you need to change your resistance coils regularly when they are clogged up, so as not to affect the taste of your e-cigarette e-liquids, and also to limit the unnecessary production of potentially toxic substances, your vaping budget can soon increase every week. Here is how to make you own resistance coils.

First of all, you need a rebuildable atomizer. Indeed, this type of atomizer allows you to change the resistance coil as you see fit. However, there is a learning curve with this type of gear. Its not complicated by any means, but, using trial and error, you should manage it over time. The principle is based on two parameters: the resistance wire and the wick.

Without going into detail, the most commonly used resistance wire would be Kanthal. Other types of metal can be used, particularly for temperature control. However, we will get back to that in a future article.

To make your resistance coil, you will need some cutting pliers and a shaft of about 2 mm (such as a screwdriver for example, or coilers, which are shafts designed specifically for vaping). By winding the resistance wire around the shaft, you will create a coil consisting of around 3 to 6 windings according to the desired ohm value and the thickness of your wire. The steps are as follows:

For the wick, cotton is mainly used. Take care not to use the cotton that you usually find in makeup removal products. It is preferable to source this cotton in specialist e-cigarette stores. The more absorbent the cotton, the better the vaping experience will be. Once again, you will need to change your resistance coil or your cotton wick quite regularly to obtain consistent vaping quality. You will note that some e-liquids clog resistance coils up more than others. Its up to you to adjust the flavour concentration if you make your own liquids (DIY), or to select products that meet your quality requirements. As a general rule, the sweeter the liquid, the more it will tend to clog up the resistance coil.

You can decide to make your own resistance coils for more than just budget reasons. The enjoyment you get out of making your set-ups allows you to tailor your vaping experience to your exact needs and produce unique sensations.

The choice is yours!

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The perfect way to wick your resistance coil - Vaping Post

All forms of smoking and vaping will be banned across Metro Vancouvers public transit system starting next month.

TransLinks board of directors is expected to approve this week a new 12th Rule in the public transit authoritys list of rules and regulations on passenger conduct. This amendment to the transit charter banning smoking and vaping, and providing Transit Police with new enforcement powers would go into effect on October 30, 2021.

As it turns out, TransLink currently does not have a blanket systemwide rule specifically against smoking and vaping. Instead, it has been relying on the authority it is granted by provincial legislation from placing signage on the system, such as no smoking signs, do not enter the tracks signs, and penalty for misuse of emergency button signs.

TransLink does not currently have its own rule against smoking but rather relies on posted no smoking signage, and the requirement in section 6 of the Greater Vancouver Transit Conduct and Safety Regulation that a person comply with posted signs, reads a TransLink staff report.

Creating a TransLink rule is an additional measure we can use to meet our legal obligations under existing legislation to ensure that our public spaces and workspaces comply with the requirements for creating a tobacco and vapour free environment.

The enforcement of the 12th Rule would be performed in the same way of enforcement under existing no smoking signage, starting with transit employees refusing permission to anyone caught smoking or vaping to enter a transit vehicle or property. If the individual fails to comply with this order, they can then be fined up to $150.00.

Transit Police already have powers under the Cannabis Control and Licensing Act to issue violation tickets to individuals smoking or vaping marijuana anywhere on TransLinks system.

Following the amendments approval, TransLink will issue new communications informing the public and employees of the new enforceable rule, and install signage across the transit system to reflect the rule change.

The current no smoking signage prohibits passengers and employees from smoking within 7.5 metres of a transit vehicle, bus shelter or entrance to other transit property.

The provincial governments general laws prohibit any smoking and vaping within six metres from all doorways, air intakes, and open windows to any public and workplaces. Provincial legislation stipulates if a local authority has a stricter bylaw addressing smoking and vaping distances, it takes precedence over the provincial requirement.

TransLinks 11th Rule, mandating passengers wear masks, was added earlier in the COVID-19 pandemic, and recently reinstated.

TransLinks existing list of 11 Rules does not prohibit smoking and vaping:

TransLinks existing list of rules and regulations do not include smoking and vaping. A 12th rule will be added to make smoking and vaping an enforceable ban. Click on the image for an enlarged version. (TransLink)

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TransLink to officially ban smoking and vaping with new rule, $150 fine | Urbanized - Daily Hive

Officials at local school districts say vaping continues despite new vaping laws enacted by the Utah Legislature. It is definitely a trend that is on the up and up, and I think with COVID-19 it has just gotten worse, Provo School Board President Melanie Hall said. (AP Photo/Steven Senne, File)

Vaping still persists in its high popularity among Utahs youth, despite anti-vaping laws enacted by Utah legislators in 2020.

It is definitely a trend that is on the up and up, and I think with COVID-19 it has just gotten worse, Provo School Board President Melanie Hall said, adding that students have had more downtime to experiment with vaping.

According to Yale Medicine, there may be a link between vaping and COVID-19. A ScienceDirect study found that 13 to 24-year-old vape users were five times more likely to get a COVID-19 diagnosis.

It just seems these days that kids are more likely to start an addiction problem with vaping, Provo School Board member Nate Bryson said. We see how attractive it is to children and companies have marketed flavors like cotton candy and make it seem innocuous.

According to Ryan Bartlett of the Utah Department of Health Tobacco Prevention & Control Program, more people have turned to tobacco products during the pandemic. The pandemic is a stressful situation where people dont know what to expect. From little surveys here and there and calls to the Quitline, weve seen that there has been a bit of an uptick, Bartlett said.

Utah legislators passed a spate ofanti-vaping bills into law before the pandemic struck. There has been some progress since then. In June 2021, the Provo City School District officially joined the national lawsuit against the vape company Juul.

According to Hall, the law group driving the case is currently waiting for more districts to join and move forward.

Awareness and education can also be used to help combat the rising underage vaping issue. Bartlett said parents who are willing to have an open-minded discussion about vaping can help their children curb the habit. Students and youth who feel like they can talk about it are going to be much more likely to find the resources that they need,he said.

Students within Utah County have been making strides in spreading awareness about vaping. After a student-run effort coordinated by Outrage Youth Group and the Island Teens Advocacy Team establishing anti-vaping signs on Nebo School District buses, Provo City School District is eager to follow suit, already posting signs on some of their own buses.

Outrage coordinator Sarah Simons said she believes student-led advocacy is the best way to approach legislators with issues that directly impact youth. In addition to the anti-vaping signage, Outrage is assessing the community to better understand where the most underage vaping instances happen and will focus on raising awareness based on those needs.

Simons said the youth involved in Outrage felt empowered. They felt like they really did make a difference in the community. It felt like adults really listened to them. And they could confidently say that they were helping to combat the youth epidemic.

For more resources on vaping prevention, readers can visit the See Through the Vape and Way to Quit websites or call 1-800-QUIT-NOW.If teenagers ages 12-18 or parents are interested in getting involved with Outrage, they can contact Sarah Simons at *protected email*.

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COVID-19 credited with local rise in vaping - The Daily Universe - Universe.byu.edu

A still from The New York Times Presents: Move Fast & Vape ThingsPhoto: FX

Lets face ithumanity is facing one too many crises right now. Its an eerily ideal time for The New York Times and FXs jointly produced series of standalone documentaries, which have been airing periodically for over a year now. Featuring reporting by the newspapers staff, The New York Times Presents is a series of character-driven investigations into pertinent topics like the coronavirus ravaging New York City, the death of Breonna Taylor, and Britney Spears fight to free herself from her conservatorship. The latest is excruciatingly timely as it charts the rise of e-cigarette company Juul and its instrumental role in spreading a nicotine epidemic among young people. Like most of these films, Move Fast & Vape Things is straightforward and expertly pieced together. At just over an hour long, it covers essential facts and interviewees, including Times reporters Julie Cresswell and Sheila Kaplan. But its also just scratching the surface of a labyrinthine issue.

The film opens with two parallel worlds: the sprawling tech industry in San Francisco, where the Juul was birthed, and a more rural area, where teenager Jackie Franklin rides her bike. We soon see how the Juul, which was conceived by Stanford graduates James Monsees and Adam Bowen, invades Jackies coming-of-age, as she became addicted to vaping. Director John Pappas quietly, efficiently builds both worlds. Franklins story is a hard-hitting visual representation of the damage caused by e-cigarettes, facilitated by Juuls marketing, which was catered to millennials. Who else did they think would indulge in flavors like ice watermelon limeade vaping juice?

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September 17 on FX and Hulu at 10 p.m. ET

Hourlong documentary; entire film watched for review

Move Fast & Vape Things follows Monsees and Bowens quick rise once they established Juul in 2015. Theyd actually met a decade before that, and the two smokers embarked on a mission to invent a product that would help eliminate combustible cigarettes and hopefully save lives in the process. The Times reporters and even former Juul employees who appear in the documentary suggest that while this was the goal early on, it started to change over time. The film doesnt take sides, but its hard to ignore how damning the footage is. At one point, Monsees is giving a Ted Talk about smoking, calling it sexy and that it exudes personality. One of the companys first employees, Kurt Sonderegger, calls it the Apple of vaping industry as far as design goes. A title card reveals that Juuls vaporizer contained twice the amount of nicotine as any other device on the market.

This technology-driven, apparently less-harmful substitute became coveted by millennials and minors. Even if they didnt intend for it to happen initially, the companys top leaders and board members began to capitalize on this information. Juuls former employees claim it went from being mission-driven to growth-based. Times reporter Sheila Kaplan says rich investors showed off their luxurious lifestyle to convince Bowen and Monsees to continue to expand the market and earn more money. The Juul cofounders began to move away from their initial objective, because who wouldnt want to be a billionaire? But the film neither expands on this information nor gives any concrete names of the investors. Even though a quick Google search can provide this information (Tiger Global Management, Fidelity Investments, Tao Capital, etc.), Move Fast & Vape Things doesnt dwell on it. It prevents a detailed picture from forming, given that the investors and board members changed the companys agenda when it picked up steam within a couple years of launching.

G/O Media may get a commission

The documentary features critical interviews with Ryan Woodring, former director of market operations; Erica Halverson, former marketing manager; Steven Bailie, the creative director of a campaign called #Vaporized. They talk about being recruited to help advertise Juul pods and bringing them to a bigger market. An early commercial featured pop music, bright colors, and youth dancing with vapes in hand. Stephen Colbert was also quick to call it out in an episode of The Late Show. The ad ignores the heartbreaking journey of Jackie Franklin and her family, including her mother Janice, who also appears in the documentary. Jackie details the first time she used a Juul podIt tasted like candyand how, in the next hour, she started feeling sick. Woodring had a similar experience. Its addictive contents sent Jackies life spiraling, but she is on the mend now.

Scott Gottlieb, former FDA commissioner in Move Fast & Vape ThingsPhoto: FX

Move Fast & Vape Things also succinctly looks at the FDAs investigation into the rise of e-cigarettes. Once again, the documentary only provides a snapshot of how the federal agency tackles this growing business, one that wants to transform the gigantic tobacco industry. Their inspection has been ongoing for years now, with the most recent update coming in only a week before the documentarys premiere. This latest report reveals that the FDA has further delayed taking any action against Juuls vaping products. At present, 3.6 million young kids (middle school- and high school-age) are deemed to be using them based on official surveys. Former commissioner Scott Gottlieb appears in the film, claiming that he had warned the company about the Juul causing early addiction in teens. When asked if he wished he had done more during his tenure, his answer is simply along the lines of hindsight is 20/20. Its a crucial question, one that points to how beneficial it would have been for the filmmakers to do similar prodding throughout the documentary.

The Juul company wanted to revolutionize its industry, so it was a shock when Altria Group (parent company of Marlboro) acquired a 35% stake in 2018 for $12.8 billion. In the same year, studies found a 78% increase in Juul vaping about high school students and 48% in middle school students who were Juul users. Altrias arrival into the picture brought more attention to the company, and Monsees was even called to testify in front of Congress in 2019; footage from that day shows him to be absolutely unprepared and nervous. Juul stopped selling flavored products in 2019, but the company has nearly 2000 lawsuits to battle now. The state of North Carolina became the first group to successfully sue Juul over their teen-centered marketing, winning a $40 million settlement. Move Fast & Vape Things rushes through these developments towards the end, but the film is still a solid effort to capture the many moving parts. It almost acts as the first chapter of what will probably make a riveting, complicated, and agonizing novel.

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The Juuls reputation goes up in smoke in Move Fast & Vape Things - The A.V. Club

BEAMSVILLE, Ontario, Sept. 17, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- A group of 15 scientists, who specialize in addictions and tobacco research, have released an essay, published by the American Public Health Association, calling for a more balanced approach to regulating vaping. When a group of scientists join forces to advocate for vapings potential benefit to public health, governments everywhere should take notice. A revelatory section of their essay focuses on how vaping can increase smoking cessation, which has been proven through several research methods including randomized studies, population studies, and cigarette sales.

The Canadian Vaping Association (CVA) has raised concerns surrounding Canadas current proposed flavour ban and excise tax, on the basis that such regulation would reduce the appeal of vaping and lead to increased smoking rates. The CVAs concerns have often been dismissed as self-serving, but the release of this document by highly credible tobacco and addictions researchers, should cause regulators to reevaluate the evidence on vaping.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study reported that, in 2018, 15.1% of smokers had quit smoking for 6 months or longer using e-cigarettes, compared with 3.3% using other noncigarette tobacco products and 6.6% using no tobacco products, said the authors.

The authors cite multiple studies that demonstrate how vaping has been proven to be more effective than Nicotine Replacement Therapies (NRT) and note that population studies findings are consistent with a near doubling of quit attempt success, found in the randomized controlled trials, and the fact that e-cigarettes are smokers most used aid in quit attempts.

They leave no room for uncertainty stating, smokers unable to quit smoking with evidence-based cessation methods should be well informed about the relative risks of vaping and smoking and vapings potential to help them quit smoking.

The research indicates that cigarettes and vaping products are substitutes for one another, leading to a positive cross-price elasticity of demand that is sensitive to any changes made to the price of the items. The author shares this example: One study associated a Minnesota e-cigarette tax with increased adult smoking and reduced cessation, estimating that taxing e-cigarettes at the same rate as cigarettes nationwide could deter 2.75 million smokers from quitting smoking over a decade. The likelihood that current vapers could opt to return to smoking would be a devastating setback for Canada. This price sensitivity has already been seen in Nova Scotia, as many vapers returned to smoking or began purchasing their vaping products through the black market once the flavour ban and taxation was implemented.

Vaping has proven to be an effective harm reduction tool for smokers seeking an alternative to tobacco. Vaping can be an effective quit aid, however, taxes and flavour bans are likely to negate any positive outcome that could be achieved. The dismissal of science by Canadian health authorities depletes the public of accessible and proven tools. Vaping has successfully disrupted tobacco use, by modernizing options for smokers. Through vaping, Canada has seen remarkable reductions in smoking rates that had been stagnate for years.

Contact:Darryl TempestExecutive Director647-274-1867dtempest@thecva.org

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Canadian Vaping Association: Academics caution that restrictive regulation has unintended consequences - GlobeNewswire

A Los Angeles fire captain has sued the owners of one building and the owners of two vaping shops aftera May 2020 explosion left him with "catastrophic" injuries.

Victor Aguirre and his wife, Claudia, filed their lawsuit on Wednesday against building owner Steve Sungho Lee and hisothercompaniesas well as theownersof Green Buddha and Smoke Tokes,two smoke shopshoused inside where the explosion happened. Aguirre accuses the owners of "hazardous activity, premise liability and negligence," according tothe Los Angeles Times.

The explosion hurt12 firefighters and left Aguirre permanently injured. According to the lawsuit, he was hospitalized for two months and had to have all of his fingers partially amputated, the LA Times reported.

The property and store owners were charged with over 300 criminal counts after a criminal investigation by the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and the Los Angeles Police Department.

The owners of the smoke shops reportedly agreed to stop operating theirbusinessesand to pay the city of Los Angeles more than $100,000 as a result of plea deals they struck in November.

A report from the Los Angeles Fire Department found that the fire was fueled by too manynitrous oxide and butane containers in the smoke shops. The department had not inspected the building in at least a year at the time of the incident. The Times said that fire chief Ralph Terrazas noted that an inspection likely would have resulted in the removal of some of the materials that contributed to the fire.

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LA fire captain burned in explosion sues warehouse owners, vaping supply shop | TheHill - The Hill

A Los Angeles Fire Department captain severely burned ina May 2020 explosion inside a downtown L.A. warehousehas sued the owners of the building and a vaping supply shop housed there, accusing them of hazardous activity, premise liability and negligence.

Victor Aguirre and his wife, Claudia Aguirre, filed suit Wednesday in Los Angeles County Superior Court against property owner Steve Sungho Lee and his various companies along with the operators of Green Buddha and Smoke Tokes, a smoke and vape shop inside the East 3rd Street warehouse where the explosion occurred. Twelve firefighters were injured.

After a criminal investigation by the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and the Los Angeles Police Department, they were charged with more than 300 criminal counts.

The lawsuit claims Victor Aguirre, a 20-year veteran of the Fire Department and father of two, suffered catastrophic injuries in the explosion, including severe burns over much of his body and devastating third-degree burns to his hands. The burns resulted in so much damage that each of his fingers had to be partially amputated, and he has undergone 25 surgeries since. He was hospitalized for two months and has been able to return to the Fire Department in an administrative capacity.

Read the full story on LATimes.com.

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LAFD captain severely burned in downtown warehouse explosion sues vape shop, building owners - KTLA

When a court-set deadline for "premarket" review of nicotine vaping products came and went on Thursday, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) had received millions of applications but had not approved any. As a result, the agency says, every vaping product sold in the United Statesincluding myriad e-liquids, devices, and partsis now "subject to enforcement action at the FDA's discretion."

Seven years after the FDA officially declared its intention to regulate e-cigarettes as "tobacco products," in other words, the entire industry remains in legal limbo, existing solely thanks to the agency's enforcement discretion and limited resources. The FDA laughably maintains that it is bringing "regulatory certainty" to a market it concedes has great potential to reduce smoking-related disease and death. In reality, the agency, despite its promises of regulatory flexibility, is perpetuating a situation in which companies that tried to play by the rules have no idea whether they will still be in business next week, next month, or next year.

As of September 9, 2020, the deadline set by U.S. District Judge Paul Grimm in response to a lawsuit by anti-vaping groups, the FDA had received 6.5 million applications from more than 500 manufacturers of "new tobacco products," the vast majority of them vaping liquids or devices. That was a far cry from the 25 annual applications the FDA originally expecteda projection that suggested nearly all vaping companies would be deterred by the effort and expense required to comply with the agency's daunting regulations. Grimm gave the agency an additional year to act on those applications.

While the FDA brags that it has acted on "about 93% of the total timely-submitted applications," that number is highly misleading. Three-quarters of those actions involved 4.5 million applications from a single manufacturer, JD Nova, that the FDA deemed incompletein August because they did not include an "adequate Environmental Assessment" for each of the products, many of which had never actually been sold. In addition to seeking approval for hypothetical products, the company submitted a separate application for every flavor, strength, and size of its existing e-liquids, as required by the FDA.

As Filter's Alex Norcia noted at the time, the environmental assessment demanded by the FDA is "an onerous and complicated section that covers a product's environmental impact from the point of manufacture to disposal." Because JD Nova did not meet that requirement to the FDA's satisfaction, its applications were never formally filed. But later that month, the FDA issued its first "marketing denial orders" (MDOs), rejecting55,000 applications for "flavored" vaping products from three companies because they "lacked sufficient evidence that they have a benefit to adult smokers sufficient to overcome the public health threat posed by the well-documented, alarming levels of youth use of such products."

The FDA noted that the rejected products included "flavors such as Apple Crumble, Dr. Cola and Cinnamon Toast Cereal." Acting FDA Commissioner Janet Woodcock said "flavored tobacco products are very appealing to young people," so "assessing the impact of potential or actual youth use is a critical factor in our decision-making about which products may be marketed."

For tobacco harm reduction advocates, that rationale is alarming because it suggests a bias against e-liquids in flavors other than tobacco, which are enormously popular among smokers who switch to vaping. It also implies that the FDA's requirements for overcoming that bias may be impossible to satisfy, especially for small businesses that could not afford to spend hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars on new research.

"Based on existing scientific evidence and the agency's experience conducting premarket reviews," the FDA said, "the evidence of benefits to adult smokers for such products would likely be in the form of a randomized controlled trial or longitudinal cohort study, although the agency does not foreclose the possibility that other types of evidence could be adequate if sufficiently robust and reliable. Because this evidence was absent in these applications, the FDA is issuing MDOs."

Less than a week later, the FDA denied applications from three companies for about 800 other flavored products. It said it would "continue to review other premarket tobacco applications for non-tobacco flavored ENDS [electronic nicotine delivery systems] to determine whether there is sufficient product-specific scientific evidence of a benefit to adult smokers to overcome the risk posed to youth." All told, the FDA says, it has issued "132 MDOs for more than 946,000 flavored ENDS products."

The FDA has yet to act on applications from major manufacturers such as Juul, which in 2018 preemptively stopped selling most of its flavors in response to the agency's concerns about underage vaping. "How the FDA could fail to make a decision on Juul products is beyond me," said Michelle Eakin, chair of the American Thoracic Society's Tobacco Action Committee, in a press release. "Juul has the largest share of the e-cigarette market and its products were a primary driver in the sky-rocketing rise in youth e-cigarette use. The FDA has delayed long enough. Until the agency addresses Juul, Puffbar and other companies that are driving the youth e-cigarette market, it is failing to do its job."

Critics like Eakin think the FDA should ban all non-tobacco-flavored vaping products, despite the fact that former smokers overwhelmingly prefer them, because they also appeal to teenagers. Under the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act, the 2009 statute that the FDA used to assert authority over e-cigarettes (even though legislators did not contemplate that product category when they wrote the law), the agency is supposed to consider a product's impact on "the population as a whole," which includes underage vaping. But that collectivist calculus also includes reductions in smoking facilitated by vaping products. If banning flavored options makes these products less appealing to current and former smokers, that policy could perversely lead to more tobacco-related deaths than would otherwise occur.

"There is robust evidence that non-tobacco-flavored e-cigarettes help adults quit smoking," notes Competitive Enterprise Institute senior fellow Michelle Minton. "It seems their availability in non-tobacco flavors is, in fact, a major reason why e-cigarettes are at least twice as effective for smoking cessation as other nicotine replacement therapies."

Because of the standard set by the Tobacco Control Act, it is not enough for a manufacturer to show that its products are much less hazardous than combustible cigarettes. Nor is it enough to plausibly project that more vaping will mean less smoking (among teenagers as well as adults) and therefore fewer premature deaths. A manufacturer also has to persuade the FDA that the "public health" benefit from allowing its product to stay on the market outweighs the potential cost of vaping by teenagers who otherwise never would have used nicotine.

As a general matter, that should not be difficult, since the health hazards of nicotine itself are minimal compared to the hazards of cigarette smoking, the vast majority of teenagers who vape frequently are current or former smokers, and there is little evidence that vaping products are a "gateway" to smoking among teenagers. To the contrary, recent trends suggest the availability of these products has accelerated the downward trend in adolescent smoking, and there is reason to think that banning flavored e-liquids would have the opposite effect.

But if every manufacturer has to present "product-specific," "robust and reliable" evidence that the benefits of each variation it sells will outweigh the costs, that is a recipe for eliminating all but the biggest, wealthiest companies. Even a manufacturer that presents a "randomized controlled trial" or "longitudinal cohort study" indicating that flavored vaping products play an important role in reducing smoking has to contend with speculation about "the impact of potential or actual youth use."

Since 2015, Minton notes, the FDA "has approved new tobacco products from three companies, including flavored tobacco." Those products included "eight varieties of Swedish Match North America's snus, the heated tobacco product, IQOS, made by Philip Morris, and combustible cigarettes with reduced nicotine made by 22nd Century Group." In those cases, "the FDA was happy to accept more general evidence about the product category's appeal to adults and youth, as well as their general risks to public health." But when it comes to flavored vaping products, the FDA seems to be demanding more.

"America's tobacco and nicotine regulatory system is broken beyond repair," says Gregory Conley, president of the American Vaping Association, which supports vaping as a harm-reducing alternative to smoking. "It is absolutely absurd that the same agency that found time to ban over six million vaping products manufactured by small businesses is now indicating they need more time to review products with massive market shares. Even worse, after spending five-plus years peddling false hope to businesses across America, the FDA now can't even be bothered to grant formal extensions to the remaining pending applicants. This decision brings even more uncertainty on the day FDA had previously pledged to provide the public with answers."

Norcia reports that some manufacturers, having concluded that satisfying the FDA is impossible, are shifting toward synthetic nicotine, which is not derived from tobacco and therefore is arguably not subject to the agency's jurisdiction under the Tobacco Control Act. Assuming that legal strategy is successful, there could be many vaping products that are not even notionally subject to FDA regulation. And if the FDA refuses to approve flavored products, vapers who prefer them will still find lots of black-market alternatives, which likewise will be completely unaffected by government-prescribed standards. Given the recent experience with lung injuries caused by black-market THC vapes, that is a situation a public health agency should be keen to avoid.

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Since the FDA Has Not Approved Any Vaping Products, All of Them Are Now 'Subject to Enforcement Action' - Reason

Tour extended into last week of the election to give a voice to the 1,000,000 Canadian vapers besieged by federal and provincial regulations

Vigil planned for September 16 to honour those Canadians who have died from smoking-related illnesses

Vaping is a proven less-harmful alternative to smoking

TORONTO and QUEBEC, Sept. 13, 2021 /CNW/ - The biggest mobilization of Canadian vapers continues this week with a blitz through Toronto and the Greater Toronto Area that will include a vigil for the hundreds of Canadians who have died from smoking-related diseases since the start of the election campaign.

http://www.rights4vapers.com (CNW Group/Rights 4 Vapers)

The tour encourages vapers to speak out against the Liberal's proposed regulations that will ban all flavours, except tobacco, mint and menthol. It also wants to educate non-vapers on the realities of vaping as a tobacco harm reduction tool.

"We've been on the road for almost a month. We felt we needed to come back to the GTA to push home our message of tobacco harm reduction. The Liberal government will have no choice but to hear our voices. In the past, we have been silenced and marginalized. This tour will show candidates in this election that vapers will no longer be ignored. This is the fight for our lives," said Maria Papaioannoy, spokesperson for Rights4Vapers one of Canada's vapers' rights organizations.

Vaping is a proven less harmful alternative to smoking. Public health authorities around the world have made it clear that vaping can be an effective tool to help smokers quit smoking. But only if the right regulatory and societal frameworks are in place.

"If regulated appropriately vapour products have the potential to help millions of smokers quit smoking. Isn't this what the government wants?" said Ms. Papaioannoy. "Instead, the Liberals are threatening to remove flavours from the market. If the government is successful with this draconian regulation, it will drive thousands of current vapers back to smoking and stop millions of smokers from trying vapour products."

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Flavours are an important component to the vaping experience for adult smokers. Flavours help smokers migrate from traditional cigarettes to vapour products. In 2019, Parliament conducted hearings on amendments to the Tobacco Act (Bill S5). Experts told the federal government that flavoured vapour products are important. It's time that all governments listen.

"Since the start of the election over 3000 Canadians have died from smoking related illnesses. No one has died from vaping. We want to honour the lives of those who died with a vigil in downtown Toronto. Who is to say that with progressive regulations, truth and science based information, and accessibility to vapour products, some of these Canadians may still be alive today," said Ms. Papaioannoy.

Vapour products are the best hope for hundreds of thousands of Canadians who smoke and are looking for an alternative to cigarettes. Earlier this year, Public Health England released its latest review of vapour studies. It found that "the best thing that a smoker can do is to stop smoking completely and the evidence shows that vaping is one of the most effective quit aids available, helping around 50,000 smokers quit a year."

According to research published by the Consumer Choice Center, there are upwards of 1.5 million adult Canadian vapers in Canada. Approximately 955,000 of those adult consumers currently use flavoured vape products. A full ban on vaping flavours would likely push most of those consumers back to smoking.

Vape Tour 2021 will reach out to the forgotten 1,250,000 Canadian vapers. More and more regulations at both federal and provincial levels are threatening the access, availability, and affordability of vapour products. Vape Tour 2021 will bring the truth about vaping to towns and cities across Quebec and Ontario and mobilize vapers. It's time to save vaping. It's time to save lives.

Event Schedule:What: Vigil for those who have died from smoking related illnessesWhen: Thursday September 16Time: Begins at 6:30 p.m.Where: March starts at Yonge and Adelaide and will culminated in a silent vigil at Yonge and Dundas Square

SOURCE Rights 4 Vapers

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Vape Tour 2021 Arrives in the Greater Toronto Area - Yahoo Finance