ok, here's a couple more (I'm still writing them based on what I find from ANTZ)
Your Comment Tracking Number: 1jy-8dnb-rdf8
As a 45 year + smoker, I am a primary stakeholder in FDA's deeming regulation. I've tried patches, gum, acupuncture, hypnosis, and except for chantix (just once), more times than I can count. My 2 non-smoking ex-husbands probably have a better count. Nothing made much difference. Finally, quitting became so demoralizing and demeaning that I gave up on quitting.
I bought an electronic cigarette out of curiosity at a gas station. It was better than other products but didn't help much. Almost a year later I walked into a local vape shop and the staff helped me find an electronic cigarette customized to help me quit. The level of nicotine I needed was less than the daily dose in NRT's. I was missing the vapor. Maybe it's inhaling deeply. There's a lot to learn beyond nicotine addiction.
I remembered from "Quit Smoking" literature to change familiar flavors when quitting so I intentionally did not choose tobacco flavors. My taste buds were numb so all I could taste were strong, sweet flavors like gummy bears. No joke.
I firmly believe cigarette smoking should be discouraged and
vaping is one more way to do that. What I see as the biggest health benefit is having parents and grandparents around to council kids against smoking without puffing on a cigarette while I'm doing it. I can smell if my teen has smoked now and before I couldn't. That is an immediate benefit - not something 20 years from now. Vapers can become militant non-smokers just as fast as ex-smokers do.
Vapers are also compelled to give other smokers the opportunity to quit like ex-alcoholics do with AA. That is how the electronic cigarette industry has grown so fast without advertising. Devices were designed to help smokers make a quit attempt which a corporation can't do as easily because quitting is a "limited growth market" (WSJ, Herzog, Wells Fargo Investments) which was a reason tobacco companies didn't buy into the market until after 2012. In fact, tobacco companies have contributed nothing towards developing products that help smokers quit - just as ineffective as pharmaceutical companies have been for all these years. Chantix is an example of a cure worse than the disease with thousands of deaths.
Just as cigars can be divided into 2 markets, so can electronic cigarettes. There is the phony tobacco company device that has changed little, standardized, sold everywhere for less than $30, most likely to promote dual use and most accessible to youth. If the FDA were worried about "renormalizing smoking" that is the device to target.
Instead the FDA is targeting 99% of unique products, some are manufactured in the USA including chipsets. These devices cost more than $100 and are designed to help smokers quit, avoiding dual use, customizable, sold in stand alone shops where screening is more effective and support thousands of small independent business'. One online retailer claimed to offer 10,000 unique products not including
eliquids. These devices require more knowledge to operate so they are less available to youth exploration.
The OMD Economic Impact didn't even bother to collect figures on the electronic cigarette market and instead used a percentage of cigar sales - what do cigar sales have to do with ecigs? They also predicted the market would be reduced to 25 products and state that consumer choice would be limited but not necessarily the volume of sales. On what planet does that advice apply to?
The FDA has no idea what they are regulating nor does it seem like they care. I'd swear the bulk of the deeming regulations were written by industry lawyers and accountants since only the pharmaceutical and tobacco companies could see the value in the regulations, as "exciting" and it appears that TVECA (tobacco companies) had advance knowledge before regulations were published.
I understand the FDA is largely supported by application and filling fees which also make it appear to be an employee of the industries paying them and there's little reason to disagree when most of the regulations concern competition and marketplace control and little to do with valid (not imaginary) threats to public health.
If electronic cigarettes posed a risk for non-smokers wouldn't that be spotted as a trend over the last five years? Instead both youth and adult smoking rates have declined proving that is not a risk and ecigs are a benefit to public health.
The FDA risks undermining their credibility and loosing public trust by supporting deeming as it is written. When I read about how Sweden came to have the lowest smoking rates and realized I could have reduced my harm ten years ago, I wondered where I could send my medical bills for reimbursement for the damage done to my health from being mislead by the FDA and CDC. I can never fully trust these agencies again.
I know the FDA understands the continuum of risk for nicotine products and it's past time to tell the public the truth. I hope the FDA will do the right thing.
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and I couldn't resist ...
Your Comment Tracking Number: 1jy-8dom-85f1
As a vaper I would like to urge the FDA to ban all flavors from all products for adults. To prevent kids from becoming addicted to coffee, it should taste like water. Adults should not have flavored alcohol and that should be made to taste like water - and there should be no difference between vodka, whisky, rum or scotch. Alcoholism is a serious disease and a frequent cause for life threatening car accidents. All of our insurance rates would go down immediately. The Senate should not be allowed to have a candy desk - yes, there is a candy desk in the senate!!! No wonder they are all wired up and can't focus on getting anything done. What kind of a role model does that provide for our children! Soda's should have no flavoring or no sugar and should taste the same as alcohol, er water. Food coloring isn't healthy either, I guess. I'm not sure what to do here but I bet the FDA does.
I expect this to happen before April of next year since this has been going on for far too long - at least two centuries! Where was the FDA in the 1800's when all of this started? The FDA should be doing a much better job. They should have predicted this when the FTSPCA act was signed, even if some of these products didn't exist yet - the FDA should have known that someday they would.
Thank you very much for reading.
