CASAA New York State SALES BAN Call to Action!

[JENerationX]

Interesting, since most of the letters from my family, friends etc. said we would support Senator Johnson's bill. Ban sales to minors by all means, just don't take my lifeline away. YAY!!!!!

Thank you to anyone and everyone that wrote in, called in, and spread the word.

 

[Poeia]

Since S7635 is not on today's NY Senate Rules Cmte agenda
New York State Senate
the bill is dead.

But interestingly, Senator Johnson's bill (S2926B) to ban e-cig sales to minors is on the Rules Cmte meeting agenda.

If the Rules Cmte approves Johnson's bill, its still possible that it could be enacted since the Assembly already passed Linda Rosenthal's identical bill.

Maybe that was the idea behind S7635 -- to get S2926B passed. Lots of people wrote to them and, instead of writing "keep your mitts off my PV" we wrote "I support S2926B."

 

[Bill Godshall]

It appears to me that the reason Sen. Hannon introduced S7635 two weeks ago, while simultaneously not allowing the Health Cmte he Chairs consider either of the two bills to ban e-cigarette sales to minors, was to prevent the enactment of legislation to ban e-cigarette sales to minors.

It would be helpful to know if the NY ACS or other e-cig prohibitoinists urged Hannon to introduce S7635, and it would be interesting to see if Hannon has recently received contributions from drug companies.

 

[EJH]

It appears to me that the reason Sen. Hannon introduced S7635 two weeks ago, while simultaneously not allowing the Health Cmte he Chairs consider either of the two bills to ban e-cigarette sales to minors, was to prevent the enactment of legislation to ban e-cigarette sales to minors.

It would be helpful to know if the NY ACS or other e-cig prohibitoinists urged Hannon to introduce S7635, and it would be interesting to see if Hannon has recently received contributions from drug companies.

Looking up his contributions in the last 2 years or so at the NYS Board of Elections site, I recognized Johnson & Johnson and Eli Lilly as contributing drug companies (could be more that I didn't recognize) and a lot of insurance companies (don't know if this means anything to e-cigs...I just found it interesting)

EJ

 

[Placebo Effect]

Bill to ban e-cigarette sales to minors PASSES the Senate!

Your e-mails to the members of the Rules Committee worked

http://wnyt.com/article/stories/S2664391.shtml?cat=300

 

[Poeia]

Good. It should be treated like a nicotine delivery system and therefore illegal to sell to minors. And having this in place means the senate & assembly will probably be less likely to bother with additional legislation in the future.

 

[EJH]

The bill to restrict sales to adults was originally a bill for an outright ban when Assy. Rosenthal first proposed it. It morphed into a ban of sale to minors (pure speculation here btw) after supporters found they didn't have enough support for a ban.

Hannon likely introduced the latest bill for banning as a last-ditch effort to get a ban in place, because he knew that once a ban to minors passes, getting support for a ban (which was hard to come by originally) would be much harder to get. It seems that Hannon couldn't even find a sponsor in the Assembly for a companion to S7635.

Again, all speculation here.

Interestingly, Hannon (and every senator) voted for the minor sales ban.

I can't imagine the governor would not sign this bill now that it has overwhelmingly passed both chambers.

EJ

 

[Vocalek]

Looking up his contributions in the last 2 years or so at the NYS Board of Elections site, I recognized Johnson & Johnson and Eli Lilly as contributing drug companies (could be more that I didn't recognize) and a lot of insurance companies (don't know if this means anything to e-cigs...I just found it interesting)

EJ

Yes, it does. Johnson & Johnson developed several of the NRT products and, as I understand the situation, licensed the manufacture to GlaxoSmithKline. I imagine J&J still makes money from NRTs. Also, Johnson & Johnson was the founder of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation which provides funding to such folks as Ellen Hahn at the Kentucky Center for Smoke-free Policy. She has been urging local governments to include e-cigs in smoking bans.

 

[DC2]

The Robert Woods Johnson Foundation is the Evil Empire as far as we are concerned.

They help fund all of the people who are against us.
In fact, they actually provided the money to start Campaign for tobacco Free Kids.

And yes, the Robert Woods Johnson Foundation is basically Johnson & Johnson in sheep's clothing.

 

[EJH]

Going back and taking a closer look at Sen. Hannon's campaign contributors since 1/1/2010, I noticed a few interesting contributions from, among others,:

PHRMA
Abbott Laboratories
Bayer
Amgen
Daiichi Sankyo (makes cancer drugs)
Astellas Pharma US
Astra Zeneca
Novartis
Pfizer
Pharmacy PAC of NYS
Takeda Pharmaceuticals

Here's the link to the search I used:
http://www.elections.ny.gov:8080/pl...0000&ZIP1=&ZIP2=&ORDERBY_IN=N&CATEGORY_IN=ALL

EJ

 

[Placebo Effect]

The bill to restrict sales to adults was originally a bill for an outright ban when Assy. Rosenthal first proposed it. It morphed into a ban of sale to minors (pure speculation here btw) after supporters found they didn't have enough support for a ban.

Rosenthal proposed the all-out bans during the 2010 and 2011 legislative sessions. The 2010 bill passed the full Assembly and was never acted upon in the Senate. The 2011 bill only passed a committee in the Assembly.

Rosenthal definitely did recognize that she was extremely unlikely to get the all-out ban bill through. Her bill even morphed during the course of this legislative session, as the original bill had some silly provisions (like requiring the NY Department of Health to warn adults, not just children, about the hazards of e-cigarettes in their anti-cigarette materials). CASAA only got behind the bill when it was drastically simplified.

 

[Poeia]

She was the one who said she was able to quit smoking without a PV -- she used the patch, made a plan and stuck to it -- so we should be able to, too.

I never understood why she was allowed to use the product of her choice and we weren't. After all, lots of people quit cold turkey with a plan.

 

[kristin]

Because "our method" isn't approved by the FDA. If they had their druthers, cold turkey wouldn't be legal to recommend, either. In fact, they pretty much have that covered - most doctor's are taught/urged/forced to recommend NRTs over any other method, even though it's been shown that most former smokers who quit permanently actually didn't use an NRT to quit. The "twice as effective as cold turkey" statistic is only for short term success - NRT actually has a 93% or higher FAILURE rate long term.

 

[Poeia]

When I tried Wellbutrin my doc gave me a prescription that said 2x a day but he told me that for the first week it should be once a day. He couldn't write that down because it's a sure sign to the insurance company that it was being prescribed for quitting smoking rather than as an antidepressant and they didn't cover that. They'd pay for cancer care but not quit smoking meds. To me that's a pretty sure sign that they know covering it is just throwing money away.

 

[Vocalek]

Going back and taking a closer look at Sen. Hannon's campaign contributors since 1/1/2010, I noticed a few interesting contributions from, among others,:

PHRMA
Abbott Laboratories
Bayer
Amgen
Daiichi Sankyo (makes cancer drugs)
Astellas Pharma US
Astra Zeneca
Novartis
Pfizer
Pharmacy PAC of NYS
Takeda Pharmaceuticals

Here's the link to the search I used:
http://www.elections.ny.gov:8080/pl...0000&ZIP1=&ZIP2=&ORDERBY_IN=N&CATEGORY_IN=ALL

EJ

Pfizer makes that wonderful smoking-cessation drug that consumers are just crazy about: Chantix. [IRONY Alert]

See Institute for safe Medication Practices report

Varenicline (CHANTIX,CHAMPIX) Update

This aid to smoking cessation acquired a warning in July 2010 about increased risk of serious cardiovascular effects following two new studies. While the FDA declared the risks to be “small,” the adverse event data for the 4th quarter of 2010 suggest these studies may have underestimated the overall vascular adverse effects by limiting the focus to only the most serious events. We found seven additional potential vascular effects not included in these studies including hypertension, dizziness, visual and memory impairment and confusional state. All may be potentially linked to vasoconstriction or vasodilation, effects related to the nicotinic receptors that are bound by varenicline. Meanwhile, the Veterans Administration (VA) restricted the use of varenicline, citing risks of suicidal behavior and violence. The VA made varenicline a second-line drug to be used only if bupropion (ZYBAN) or nicotine patches had failed, and mandated a mental status exam to eliminate patients at greatest risk for psychiatric side effects.

http://www.ismp.org/quarterwatch/pdfs/2010Q4.pdf

Use of Chantix has been banned by the FAA for pilots. Also

Thursday the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration issued a warning to medical examiners who qualify truckers for commercial driving licenses against issuing licenses to users of Chantix.

Chantix Use By Truckers Prohibited | Farah and Farah Legal Blog

 

[NorthOfAtlanta]

But they can give this to anyone who is going to be driving a 3000 lb weapon on the streets, makes perfect sense to me.

 

[Bill Godshall]

After the Senate Rules Cmte approved S2926, the Senate substituted A9044 (Rosenthal's identical bill that had already been approved by the Assembly) for S2926, and then the Senate unanimously approved A9044.
Bills

Its amazing the inaccuracies in the news blurb at http://wnyt.com/article/stories/S2664391.shtml?cat=300
as the ACS lobbied to ban e-cig sales to adults and opposed legislation to ban e-cig sales to minors, and about a dozens states have enacted laws banning e-cig sales to minors (not just the four states they mentioned).

 

[grandmato5]

Although the legislative session has now ended in NYS that doesnt mean that a sales ban wont try to rear its ugly head again in the next session or more statewide useage bans wont attempt to be enacted. The non-profit agency that I work for is holding an open house tomorrow to celebrate our 35th year of service to our community. We've been notified that one of our US Senators will be sending a representative and several of our NYS legislators have said they are attending themselves. I spent the afternoon putting together some packets of information about e-cigs and I plan on having several of my e-cigs and APV's setting out on my desk. My boss may not be thrilled with me tomorrow, but none of these people will be leaving my office without accurate information in their hands and a mini face to face coarse in vaping 101. The first weekend in August I'll be spending time again with these legislators at another event my husband is involved with and I plan to follow up again with more discussion about ecigs .

Edit from meetings today (6/26): Having spoken in person to 4 legislators and one representative here are my thoughts for the day. One person will likely remain forever in the anitsmoking/vaping camp. 3 out of 5's first reaction to my vaping in front of them was to ask "Why dont I smell any smoke ?". 3 of them seemed genuinely interested in my comments about the FDA report against Ecigs. (one of them was really hard to read as to if I was making any progress for our cause or not) None of them had ever seen any APV's and were all really interested in them with many questions. three of the people said that seeing a demonstation in person and actually speaking in person to someone that had been using these devises for almost two years had a far greater effect on their thoughts about ecigs then any emails, letters or phone calls they had previously received on the subject promising to read all the information I gave them in their packets. They were all made aware that I will be asking them if they did indeed read the information when I see them again in August and three promised to bring with them any questions they might have about the information. I know I made a difference, only time will tell if it was enough of a difference to help defeat any future attacks on our ecigs when the antis again wage a war against our right to vape.

 

[rothenbj]

That is awesome grandmato5

 

[Poeia]

I got this from Liz Krueger today. Of course it's a form letter (I wouldn't want her to waste her time writing hundreds of tailored responses), but it's a good one. It covers all the salient points. My only quibble is that she semi-believes the FDA line about carcinogens.