Now is the Time To Act! I am Serious! **updated**

[navyboym]

Very nicely put, Skeptic. You're correct on all points.

Bottom line: When we have science on our side, we'll have a platform from which to argue. But we long ago stopped the selling of snake oil from covered wagons. e-liquid is today's snake oil. It needs regulation, no matter how much some individual might want it.

This is not about "personal choice"; it's about safety and efficacy. And about proper exercise of authority from the agency charged with assuring that in our foods and drugs.

So then I would well beleive that you support the normal process that the FDA must go through to approve e-liquids, there by enforcing a complete ban of it until more studies pile into the FDA and when they're good and ready to approve it.

They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.

 

[Webby]

So then I would well beleive that you support the normal process that the FDA must go through to approve e-liquids, there by enforcing a complete ban of it until more studies pile into the FDA and when they're good and ready to approve it.

They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.

Sadly, therein lies the rub.

Few here will argue that the “normal process” of the FDA is bureaucratic travesty. It’s also wrong to assume the US Government is going to continue to permit armchair chemists to keep generating bathtub e-gin without any kind of oversight whatsoever.

The e-cig industry is the elephant in the room that legislators don’t know how to deal with. Knee jerk response has been for them to let the anti smoking lobby fight the issue by likening e-cigs to cigarette smoking in general. Let enough municipal and state battles fall under the goose stepping boots of smoking bans and the issue becomes moot. Quiet enough major markets and no one will listen (or care) to what Indiana, Alabama or New Mexico users (for example) say.

The slow, steady stream of AG pushes will take the legs out of the consumer battle before any real offensive is mounted. California was the rebel win no one expected, but no real momentum was established to carry it on.

The fight is far from over, but arguments of syntax and semantics have GOT to be put aside. This battle is bigger than any one person or group’s take on e-cigarettes. We have to all concede a little on our personal slant of the fight or we will go down fighting for our own personally worded battles at the cost of the war.

 

[Skeptic]

The fight is far from over, but arguments of syntax and semantics have GOT to be put aside. This battle is bigger than any one person or group’s take on e-cigarettes. We have to all concede a little on our personal slant of the fight or we will go down fighting for our own personally worded battles at the cost of the war.

The point that I make is where you see a war, I see a process of necessity. Some here seem to view FDA bans as attacks on our liberties, which I find to be rather silly. In this country, we are overly taxed, and too much of our tax money is wasted on things we just don't need and things the government has no business with. So I take some comfort in knowing that at least some of my tax money is spent looking out for my safety.

Much of the red tape involved in FDA approval lies in the development of protocols for the regulation of a substance, not just the evaluation of safety risks. While we all know that the existing glycol/nicotine solutions are safe to vaporize and inhale, that may not be the case when the market expands and people try to innovate for the sake of competition.

Without regulation, it wouldn't be long before some genius decides to make a vapor inhaler for caffeine. Sure, e-cigs are safe and caffeine is safe, so there's no problem right? Until someone starts bleeding from their ears.

 

[Bill Godshall]

Skeptic wrote (on the previous thread):

"However, before you go around accusing the FDA of strong-arming this *new* industry under influence of monetary interest, keep in mind that they did the same thing to nicotine gum and patches when they first arrived on the scene."

This is incorrect, as the FDA didn't grossly misrepresented the health risks of NRT gums or patches to the news media or the public, and the FDA never blocked shipments of NRT patches or gums.

During the early 1990's, the FDA approved applications (that included the results of a clinical trial) submitted by several drug companies to market (via prescription) NRT gums and skin patches as smoking cessation aids.

Around 1994, several anti smoking organizations (including Smokefree Pennsylvania) and several drug companies joined forces and successfully urged the FDA to allow NRT products to be sold Over-The-Counter (OTC) to make the products less expensive and more accessible to smokers.

Nearly two years ago, NY State Health Commissioner Richard Daines submitted a citizen's petition to the FDA:
Requesting Expansion of Availability of Nicotine Replacement Therapy to Consumers who use Tobacco
Regulations.gov
encouraging the agency to:
- allow NRT products to be sold in less expensive daily doses (e.g. $5-$10/packages),
- allow NRT products to be sold in all stores that sell cigarettes, and
- modify warning labels on NRT gums/lozenges/patches/inhalers to inform smokers that NRT products are far less hazardous alternatives to cigarettes.

While dozens of public health advocacy groups have submitted public comments urging FDA approval of Daines' NRT petition (with half of the public comments submitted in response to my alerts urging folks to do so), and while nobody has submitted a comment opposing the petition, the FDA has not yet acted upon it.

Ironically, just one drug company (i.e. GlaxoSmithKline, via Mitch Zeller at GSK funded Pinney Associates) has submitted a comment in support of this petition.

Meanwhile, several of the most heavily funded anti tobacco groups have chosen to NOT submit comments to the FDA in support of this long overdue NRT petition, including: Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids, the national offices of American Cancer Society and American Heart Association, Action on Smoking and Health (ASH), Americans for Nonsmokers Rights, and NJ GASP.

So in addition to opposing the use of e-cigarettes as less hazardous alternatives to cigarettes, it appears that these organizations don't want NRT products more accessible and affordable to smokers, and don't want smokers to be truthfully informed that NRT products are far less hazardous alternatives to cigarettes.

Regarding FDA regulation of E-liquid, I urged the FDA (in my comments regarding tobacco regulations) to propose reasonable and responsible regulations for both e-cigarettes and e-liquid to ensure product safety and to ensure that the products contain what the ads and package claim.

 

[420GypsyGirl]

You know what might get us some good air time - Huffington Post. If we can get Arianna to do a piece on E-cigs...maybe we can start getting some public opinion discussion going that will open this can up and educate the public on the need for e-cigs and their benfits. I suggest we start a writing compaign to Arianna and the Huffington Post.