I don't see how this proves that they were able to overcome superstition and political expediency and it is a clear mandate against less harmful products, and I'd still say the tobacco companies were definitely more aware of this risk to their profits, but it is definitely of note. Burr is quoted:
"There are electronic cigarettes . . . and other products that have less risk. All those products in February 2007 were not in the marketplace. They are banned. They are eliminated. What are we asking the FDA to do? We are asking them to grandfather three categories of products and let all adults who choose to use a tobacco product choose from the most risky categories
Thanks for pointing this out. I looked to the source of the note and it is also interesting that Sen. Burr was 'on to them' from the start. It's worth reading the whole thing....
Congressional Record
... but some 'highlights':
"The provisions in this bill--
I might say this was slightly over 2 years ago. As I have pointed out
and talked about last week for over 5 hours on
H.R. 1256, the authors
of the bill didn't even change the dates in the bill from the bill
written 2 years ago. As a matter of fact, the section by section is the
same bill written 10 years ago. So I think it is appropriate, if they
are going to use an effective date of February 2007, that I use the
comments of the FDA Commissioner at the time, who said:
"The provisions in this bill would require substantial
resources, and FDA may not be in a position to meet all of
the activities within the proposed user levels. . . . as a
consequence of this, FDA may have to divert funds from other
programs, such as addressing the safety of drugs and food, to
begin implementing this program."
"This is not Richard Burr, this is the former Commissioner of the FDA [note: this IS Sen. Burr quoting the former FDA Commissioner, also named Burr) saying we may have to divert funds from other programs, such as safety of drugs and food." ...
"Make sure when I go to the grocery store and buy food in a global marketplace,
where the melons might have come from Chile or the spinach from Mexico,
that they have the best and brightest addressing food safety.
They have already flunked that several times in the last 3 years, and
we have all dealt with the consequences of it. But think about what we
are getting ready to do. We are getting ready to make it worse." ...
"Then the industry came up with filtered cigarettes, and they reduced
the risk by 10 percent, from 100 percent to 90 percent. But when one is
looking for a way to play this, a 90-percent risk is not a good one.
"What
H.R. 1256 says is: OK, we realize FDA is not the right agency,
but we are going to place it there anyway, and we are going to tell the
FDA: We want you to leave this alone; we don't want you to touch this
100-percent risk or 90-percent risk. We want to grandfather all the
products that were made before February 2007. And, oh, by the way, that
would include U.S. smokeless tobacco.
"The most risky we are grandfathering in and we say to the FDA: You
can't change it. You basically can't regulate it. You can't regulate
the 100 percent, you can't regulate the 90 percent, and you can't
regulate this small but growing U.S. smokeless market that has a risk
of 10 percent.
"One might look at the chart and say there are other things on there.
There are electronic cigarettes, tobacco-heating cigarettes, Swedish
smokeless snus. There are dissolvable and other products that have less
risk. All those products in February 2007 were not in the marketplace.
They are banned. They are eliminated."
"The authors of this bill said its purpose is to reduce the
risk of death and disease and to reduce youth smoking. I would tell you
that a caveat to that should be that we should reduce smoking. Clearly,
the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says that if you do
nothing, it goes to this point, and the Congressional Budget Office,
after looking at the bill, suggests it is 2 percent or 4 percent higher
if, in fact, we pass the bill. Why is that? How could it possibly be
higher if you pass legislation that is supposed to fix it? Well, it is
for this reason: It is because of what
H.R. 1256 does.
It is not a
public health bill. It is a bill that locks in the most risky products
and grandfathers them to the Food and Drug Administration and allows no
pathway for reduced-harm products to come to market. It actually takes
some reduced-harm products that are currently on the market, that
haven't been sold since February 2007, and says, therefore, they are
gone."