FDA may soon propose regulation that could ban many/most e-cigarette products, eliminate many/most companies

[nopatch]

1ml of 16mg/ml e-liquid contains about as much nicotine as the average commercial cigarette: 1.63%. I suggest moving away from the scientific terminology of milligrams and milliliters that are not well understood and use terms that the average person understands: "Most former pack-a-day smokers use less than a teaspoon(5ml) per day of liquid with an optional small percentage (<5%) of nicotine."

That is an accurate statement of fact which may help minimize taxation. One Ml of eliquid equivalent to one cigarette.

 

[progg]

totally respect your position. i've taken it many times. but the defeatist attitude is to assume market regulation cannot be done correctly. just because it's done naively most (all?) of the time. practice makes perfect. live free or die. please go with the former.

Ah, a reasonable response. I understand but disagree with your hopes of man's ability to perfect the regulatory impulse.

Although I commented in the evaluative in regards to regulation, my fundamental position disagrees with Government intrusion into private matters.

My since passed Grandmother's, sage advice to America -- mind your P's and Q's and mind your own business.

[ She chose your former - live free.]

 

[Thulium]

That's actually more confusing to me somehow. But, who are we aiming this verbage at? Consumers want it simple but comparable to smoking. FDA wants it technical. Sellers want it to look like a bargain.

None of those. We need to keep in mind the non-smokers who only know what the FDA has told them about tobacco and e-cigarettes. People who aren't really in the market for an e-cig, but doesn't know what to believe about their "safety and effectiveness".

Side note: "Safety and effectivenes" is an incomplete thought, abbreviated from the FDA requirement that medical/therapeutic products must undergo premarket testing to show that they are "safe and effective for their prescribed use"--things aren't proven "safe and effective" in absolute terms, they are proven to be safe for their intended use and effective at their intended treatment.

I think we are simply at the point of divergence between FDA, seller, and consumer interests. As a consumer I want to relate consumption size/cost to smoking for both cost and health reasons. The seller quite properly wants to make the cost to the consumer attractive while maximising profit. The FDA on the other hand, wants to take whatever the average usage is and then a) make the daily use lower to help us stop using it altogether, and b) make the cost as painful as possible for cessation reasons as well as contribute to the reparation fund, both of which are because it's another harmful tobacco product. (By the way as I've said before nicotine is a tobacco product as much as tires are a motor vehicle product).

Isn't mg/ml what everyone uses when talking about cigarettes, just shortened to mg?

Yes, and your next question illustrates the problem as this can be misleading. If you say you're using "36mg e-liquid" it sounds a bit technical (metric is the scientific standard, and when many people start hearing mega/mill, giga/nano their eyes glaze over unless they happen to be the sort of nerd who llikes that sort of thing. You aren't even vaping 36milligrams unless you are sicking your mouth on the business end of theatrical fog machine with the power to vaporize a liter of e-liquid in about an hour.

Some fun with math: You're vaping about 5 microliters per puff (1ml / 200 puffs) of a propylene glycol and/or glycerine based food flavorings with a small percentage of nicotine. That amount of 16mg/ml e-liquid would actually contain .08mg (80 micrograms) of nicotine


What you may not realize is that the actual nicotine content of cigarette tobacco is a somewhat guarded secret...a trade secret. Keep in mind that although burning cigarettes is a very effective method of delivering nicotine through deep lung tissue, it is not particularly efficient: Of 90% of the nicotine in a cigarette is destroyed when burnt and/or lost to sidestream smoke and the sticky burnt nicotine combined with myriad other products of combustion are collectively measured as "tar". Because smokers don't generally swallow the tobacco whole, the actual amount of nicotine in the tobacco is mostly irrelevant, anyway. The common use of "1mg per cig" is because, mostly regardless of how much nicotine is actually contained in the cigarette, most smokers will adjust the way they smoke (take longer, more intense or more frequent puffs, tamper with the filter) until they find a satisfying amount of nicotine which seems to average right around 1mg of nicotine absorbed per cigarette smoked.

And as a total noob, what you just said '1ml of 16mg/ml' contains as much as an avg commercial cig doesn't jive with me being a 22 RYO a day smoker and being satisfied now with about 3ml of juice (granted it's 24mg/ml). Is in fact the absorption rate higher with vapes?

Although commercial cigarette tobacco [/i]contains[/i] 1.63% (or 16.3mg/g), it generally only delivers about 1mg per cigarette.

If your RYO tobacco is around the average commercial cigs and you used about a gram of tobacco in each, that is a total of 358.6mg of nicotine contained in your cigs that delivered about 22mg. Now you are using 3ml x 2.4% = 72mg of nicotine to absorb roughly the predicted 22mg. (BTW, if I'm not mistaken, the 15milligrams of nicotine that are contained in a cigarette but not absorbed by the smoker is very closely associated with the amount of "tar" generated.)

Bottom line: You are vaping .13636... milliliters (1/36th of a teaspoon) of e-liquid containing 3.2727... milligrams of nicotine for each RYO cigarette you used to smoke.

Forgive me for not knowing, I've been using vapes only a week now and a RYO user for the last 5 years so it's been that long since I've seen a pack.

Good on ya! Let me know if you find out the actual nicotine content of the tobacco you used.

Regardless, doesn't it just need to be realistic? I think we are all best served if a cart or ml just accurately equates to past cigarette use. I used a filter on my RYOs and I rolled them with a roller to roughly 3/4 the size or smaller of a store-bought (5.3mm dia, 68mm total length, 15mm filter length). My 2 year avg was 22 a day. As I said, that now equates to about 3ml/day of 2.4% liquid. I'd like to up it to 3.6% to see if I can get down to 2ml/day for cost reasons only. Don't we just need more stats from vape users about previous brand, strength, flavor, and consumption vs. current vape strength, flavor, & consumption?

Because of the extremely small quantities we use, measuring e-liquid in milliliters only makes good sense. I'm not suggesting that we toss out all the conventional jargon, I'm just suggesting that we need to avoid jargon when talking to people who may not smoke or vape. "3 mil a day of 24 meg juice" sounds illicit and/or technical. Referring to nicotine strength by percentage is, IMO, a very good way to do that.

 

[St. Nick]

This is why from July of last year when I joined ECF, I've been strongly advocating the elimination of the words E-Cigarette or Electronic Cigarette and to start calling them Personal Vaporizers (PV's), & stopping the use of all PV's that remotely resemble analogs. We have to distance ourselves from that former industry and change our vocabulary, but I think it's already too late, heck, it was probably too late last July when I joined. The general public has such a negative reaction to anything even related to them, that by radically changing what we say and what our PV's appeared to them to look like, we might have had a chance. Then down the road we could have gone the cigarette looking way or cigar way, or whatever. Just Mods, Mods, and more Mods, the weirder or boxier looking as possible...........anything but those smelly, evil, death causing cancer sticks everybody's been seeing for the last hundred years!!! But no, people stuck to their guns and insisted on their 510's, 901's, 808's, etc., and the general public would see those and think, "oh, they're just smoking another kind of cig----same thing, though". We have no one to blame but ourselves, but at one point early on (IMHO) I think that things could have been really different for us and our new hobby, vaping. And saying that a carto was equal to a whole pack of smokes, I know the FDA just LOVED to hear that one, they're countin' them dollars already! Lets organize the way we did for SOPA and PIPA----and look, we stopped them. Flood the web world and get involved with parallel industries and causes that are close to ours and DO SOMETHING. I think we still can get the word out about Vaping, enough to save the parts concerned with our PV's, cartos, attys, batteries, chargers, basically everything but juice and demand that they not be included in FDA regulations since all of these items can be used for purposes OTHER than inhaling nicotine. For juice, come to a some sort of an agreement about mg./day, such as 5mg., hope that we're not taxed to death, and stick to it. Three weeks from now is not a long time, but look how fast we did it for the SOPA fight. I know, I'm naive, an optimist, and probably dreaming if I believe that we can organize and actually get something done in time........but the one thing I am is stubborn and don't like to hear the words "no you can't do something" (must be my Greek heritage coming out again) so I'm in............are you?

 

[Thulium]

This is why from July of last year when I joined ECF, I've been strongly advocating the elimination of the words E-Cigarette or Electronic Cigarette and to start calling them Personal Vaporizers (PV's), & stopping the use of all PV's that remotely resemble analogs.

I don't think we need to go that far. An e-cigarette is a personal vaporizer designed to replicate the Experience of using a Cigarette as closely as possible. If someone intends to "completely switch" to vaping (ie. stop smoking altogether...possibly with the intention to eventually quit nicotine and/or vaping altogether), they will likely find that a personal vaporizer that doesn't particularly look or act like a cigarette suits them and performs better...but there's no need to throw out the term "electronic cigarettes" or "e-cigs". They are called "e-cigarettes" because the name "cigarette" has a certain appeal to someone who smokes, but not particularly interesting (if not perhaps a bit off-putting) to someone who doesn't smoke.

If someone is offended by e-cigarettes because they think it "looks too much like smoking", they should use their self-righteous disapproving tone to encourage the person to get a bigger battery or a more fashionable mod.

 

[JD4x4]

Thanx Thulium for the great info. Like my nicotine, I need to sit back & absorb a bit of the details for a while. I better understand now why you used 'teaspoon'.

I guess I tend to agree with St. Nick (GREAT name, btw) about the term 'cigarette' though. I get too many double-takes and/or widened eyes when I say that word around non-smokers. I think it's counter productive in my goal to get people looking at nicotine the same way they look at caffeine, etc. I would love to be able to see nicotine through PV delivery and caffeine compared honestly, under real world use, as to health and 'cost to society'. I think it would be enlightening and I suspect a game-changer. But alas, PV's haven't been available long enough for meaningful long term studies, yeah? That's one of the primary reasons (to me) that knee-jerk bans have no basis in fact, imo.

It's just very frustrating to see the FDA and legal system lump PV's into either a 'tobacco product' or a 'special' drug called a 'smoking cessation aid', when I think it should be a 'drug' similar to caffeine.

Me, I don't care for a de-nic carto, but rather favor a double-espresso carto.

n.b. FAAmecanic - The dog is 'Dennis' from a short run anti-smoking TV spot. I found it hysterical from the first time I saw it. The dog was hiding out back smoking while the owner came to the back door calling 'Dennis, Dennis.. time for dinner', after which Dennis took a drag and blew out a huge smoke cloud. The voice over then said something like 'Isn't smoking ridiculous?'. Of course the dog was so loveable looking (I thought), that the producer couldn't see how he totally negated the negative image they were trying to portray. I tried to edit the cig to look like a PV and make the pack look like a Blu pack. Hard to tell though.

 

[kristin]

Honestly you guys, with the abstinence-only prohibitionists, it doesn't matter WHAT we called them. If they have nicotine and something that looks like smoke is coming out of your mouth, they are against them. Even without the visible vapor, they'd be against them, unless they were FDA-approved and meant only to wean you off of nicotine. Nicotine addicts are evil, weak and socially unacceptable. The only acceptable use of nicotine is as a short-term treatment to QUIT nicotine.

It's not about health or smoking anymore. If it was, they wouldn't also be trying to ban nearly harmless smokeless tobacco products like lozenges and strips - which have absolutely no resemblance to cigarettes whatsoever. They could all look like medical inhalers and be called "unicorns" and it wouldn't matter to them. But to smokers - who want something to replace cigarettes - the familiar look, feel and name is what draws them in and gets them to switch. If the first one I saw looked like a box mod and was called a "personal vaporizer," I doubt I would have bought it. It would have been too different for me. What was/is more important - trying to appease the ANTZ and non-smokers or getting smokers to switch?

 

[Uma]

The public might rally behind us a little harder though if they thought the powers that be were trying to ban our PETS. (personal electronic thingies) (x Tyrone in a Jason Bourne novel)

 

[kristin]

Sure, until the ANTZ started telling them that the PETS (cute, BTW) were really toxic, unregulated nicotine devices that were going to spew anti-freeze and carcinogens into the air, were no better than cigarettes and would addict their children without FDA approval. (Of course, addicting children is ok if it's FDA approved, BTW, LOL!)

If we called them anything else, the ANTZ would just try to twist it around to say it "proves" that we were trying to disguise something dangerous and addicting to sound harmless and we are no better than Big Tobacco lying to the public. We can't win that one no matter how hard we try. No matter what they are called, we'd still be fighting for public approval one way or another. Better to call a spade a spade, not try to hide behind a pretty facade and just show the public with scientific evidence that spades aren't the same as a gun.

 

[wfx]

They could all look like medical inhalers and be called "unicorns" and it wouldn't matter to them.

unicorns. now that's a wonderful brand concept. for when BP brings intellicig onshore. something like champix/chantix is too subtle.

 

[Ande]

I've said it before, I'll say it again- the whole "don't call it a cigarette" argument is missing the point, as Kristin points out.

It's a cigarette replacement. Call it what you will.

But it's a replacement for cigarettes that allows us to continue our addiction with greatly reduced costs, risks, and payments to big pharma. THAT is where the high level opposition comes from.

And, we're dirty nasty horrible smokers, who provide the bulllies and busybodies with someone to persecute. They didn't know who to turn to, now that racism isn't allowed in the public sphere. (Gay folks get their share of this, too.) THIS is where the low level "on the street/in your face" opposition comes from.

We're fighting a fight to convince the massive numbers of the currently undecided (including smokers and non-smokers) to support tobacco harm reduction.

But we aren't going to convince our opponents. They're on the side that they're on for a million(dollars worth of) reasons, and they aren't going to stop or change.

Can't convince'em. Can't shoot'em.

We're just gonna have to outnumber them. Which means that we need to KEEP calling it an ecig. Cause when 50 million SMOKERS get on our side, we're gonna be hard to stop.

Best,
Ande

 

[Traver]

I would love to be able to see nicotine through PV delivery and caffeine compared honestly, under real world use, as to health and 'cost to society'. I think it would be enlightening and I suspect a game-changer. But alas, PV's haven't been available long enough for meaningful long term studies, yeah? That's one of the primary reasons (to me) that knee-jerk bans have no basis in fact, imo.

Smokers save society money because they die younger.

 

[Lisa Belle]

WE NEED YOUR HELP VAPERS!

Hawaii's state legislature recently introduced a bill that would ban the sale of electronic cigarettes to minors and classify the product and every accessory associated with it as a "tobacco product" for the purpose of taxation. As you might imagine we strongly support any measure that would ban the sale of electronic cigarettes to minors. However, the bill has many unintended consequences that endangers suppliers, supporters and users of electronic cigarettes in Hawaii and nationwide.

These bills would unfairly tax the sale of electronic cigarettes and every electronic cigarette accessory in Hawaii, regardless of whether or not it contains tobacco/nicotine, at a rate of 70% of the wholesale price. This tax in turn would force Volcanoecigs to move out-of-state or close down due to the tremendous competitive disadvantage that would be placed on us.

These bills would also force local Hawaii electronic cigarette users to either purchase supplies from out-of-state and international vendors (who are not hampered by this unfair tax) or force those users to resort to smoking again. These bills could also be used as a roadmap to affect laws in your state, which could create a domino effect of state legislation across the USA endangering access for all vapers to farily priced electronic cigarettes and accessories regardless of where they are geographically located.

THE TIME TO ACT IS NOW!!!

It's from the email that volcano fine electronic cigs sent me and I am sure any of us that have bought from this supplier. I am urging all of us to write to the Legislature of Hawaii. It seems that this will not only impact Hawaii, but all of us. The taxing of anything that could be used for producing any of the effects of delivering nicotine, to be classified as a tobacco product and a tax that will make them completely un-affordable. Ideas please on what to say before this stupid bill passes? Should it be about the benefits I have experienced from the e-cigarettes, or more about the financial unfairness? I am in a state of confusion at this moment? I will write and hope we all do too.

 

[Semiretired]

If we called them anything else, the ANTZ would just try to twist it around to say it "proves" that we were trying to disguise something dangerous and addicting to sound harmless and we are no better than Big Tobacco lying to the public. We can't win that one no matter how hard we try. No matter what they are called, we'd still be fighting for public approval one way or another. Better to call a spade a spade, not try to hide behind a pretty facade and just show the public with scientific evidence that spades aren't the same as a gun.

I agree - no matter what you call them - they are nicotine delivery devices and will be attacked. This will happen no matter how safe they are and even if it is scientifically proven to not only be safer than cigarettes, but even beneficial in some way over time. You will never get someone to agree that it is the burning from cigarettes that is the harmful components that they are fighting. Nicotine has become the baseline for the fight - not the root cause...

 

[Lisa Belle]

Nicotine is extracted from taxed tobacco, the taxes have already been paid. An American that values freedom to choose a safe alternative to smoking.

That is what I posted on this page as opposition, not so much about how wonderful this safer cigarette is:Hawaii State Legislature Bill #SB2819 Before the Feb.12, 2012 when they have every intension of signing this evil corruption into law.
SB 2819 State of Hawaii bill to TAX out of existance e-cigarettes and any mechanical device that makes using them unobtainable due to making them beyond expensive for average nicotine consumers. Measure Status
I probably could have said more. However, it's useless to defy a lie and better to talk money?

 

[rothenbj]

"If they have nicotine and something that looks like smoke is coming out of your mouth, they are against them. Even without the visible vapor, they'd be against them, unless they were FDA-approved and meant only to wean you off of nicotine. Nicotine addicts are evil, weak and socially unacceptable."

I believe that is only true today. Once modified risk, as defined by the FDA, is geared up and they approve long term use of NRT products, you will see an entirely different view. Nicotine in and of itself will be fine, AS LONG AS IT IS INCLUDED IN AN FDA APPROVED, "SAFE AND EFFECTIVE" Big Pharma product. They are, after all, the FDA's customer.

 

[Kenzi]

I am so sick of this , will it ever end?
It seems so simple to me. Vapeing has saved my lungs and I no longer blow out second hand SMOKE .
So what is the problem??
Money? It looks like smoking? what???
I hope this stops , because i am not going to stop using my PV !!!!

 

[kristin]

"If they have nicotine and something that looks like smoke is coming out of your mouth, they are against them. Even without the visible vapor, they'd be against them, unless they were FDA-approved and meant only to wean you off of nicotine. Nicotine addicts are evil, weak and socially unacceptable."

I believe that is only true today. Once modified risk, as defined by the FDA, is geared up and they approve long term use of NRT products, you will see an entirely different view. Nicotine in and of itself will be fine, AS LONG AS IT IS INCLUDED IN AN FDA APPROVED, "SAFE AND EFFECTIVE" Big Pharma product. They are, after all, the FDA's customer.

I doubt the ANTZ would ever allow anything that has visible vapor get FDA approval. If it ever does, it'll be in 25 years when they finally "prove" the vapor isn't a long-term health hazard to bystanders, LOL!

 

[Lisa Belle]

Today I did my daily surfing, visiting CASAA | The Consumer Advocates for Smoke-Free Alternatives Association I noticed the City of Indianapolis - Mayor Greg Ballard is about to throw the "baby out with the bath water" on including e-cigarettes in a indoor smoking ban. CASAA gives a link to the facebook page of the Mayor Ballard and I left this comment. Here is the link and here is the comment. City of Indianapolis - Mayor Greg Ballard - Government agency - Indianapolis, IN | Facebook
Here is the comment. Please feel free to put in all of our common sense on the subject, (not your two cents LOL)

It is unfortunate that false information about the use of personal vaporizers known as e-cigarettes is spreading like the thick, filthy orange brown cancer causing, carbon monoxide containing, fire hazardous, choking, 4000 cancer causing chemicals that have been killing generations of people known as USD Domestic Cigarettes that are legal to anyone over the age of 18. From a lack of knowledge comes the word ignorance. Please feel free to be informed of the truth, read the real scientific knowledge and all about the political lobbying activities of A.C.S., A.L.A., A.H.A. who are overtly busy spewing false propaganda to line their pockets at the expense of the health of billions of nicotine addicts in the name of naming nicotine and it's users the new enemy of the people. These groups and the pharmaceutical giants are protected by the FDA not us the American citizens they were elected to. Nicotine users who use vaping instead of smoking do not cause vehicular mayhem, domestic and criminal violence, it does not render any of it's users a danger to society the way another legal drug known as alcohol and legal and illegal mind altering drugs do. Nicotine even shows promising signs in treating some mental illnesses, especially Alzheimer's Disease. CASAA | The Consumer Advocates for Smoke-Free Alternatives Association

It's put on the boxing gloves time. We have got to be more than "pro-active", we need to hit hard and deliver every punch we can muster. whew.........I can't let them win nor can you!

 

[Debbie Lee]

Not only that if we added positive comments to that section it would be deleted and only negative comments would remain trust me on that one. I/we know for a fact they aren't getting any profit from the sale of our e-juice and hardware to vape. Therefore until they start getting their pockets lined with money any way they can they won't let this ever end. I hate em period. Dirty rotten corporate whores. IMO I don't care if I am wrong that's how they are