Yes, thank you to everyone involved. Seeing this go down in flames made me smile. Last year a more restrictive version of this bill passed the House, and now it can't even get through Committee.
Here's a rundown of the events. Quotes are not necessarily 100% correct, but I tried to be precise.
- A similar bill passed out of the House last year, but did not progress in the Senate.
- Paul Ray brought a jar of tobacco candy products to the meeting. The takeaway of this speech? Unlike cookies, tobacco should not be kept in a jar.
- Paul Ray claimed that e-cigarettes were precluded from the bill, but they were not. He later said that the bill did ban any kind of flavoring being put into the vaporizers, but he failed to mention the online sales ban. Later, he says that the online sales restriction was removed, but from my reading of the substitute bill, it was not. E-cigarettes, while separately defined from "nicotine product" in the bill, are still products that don't contain tobacco.
- Rays brought the following people for presentations: Amy Sands with State Health Department (who runs Tobacco Prevention and Control Program), Barbara Crouch (pharmacist and clinical toxologist director of Utah Poison Control Center), and Art Hansen (principal of Bonneville High School).
- Amy Sands spoke about tobacco killing 5 million people per year worldwide, implying that smokeless tobacco and e-cigarettes are a part of that problem.
- Barbara Crouch said that the majority of accidental poisoning exposures nationwide involve the ingestion of cigarettes or cigarette butts.
- Barbara Crouch: The flavored e-cartridges contain potentially lethal amounts to a child, and do not have child-resistance enclosures. So even a few drops from an empty cartridge may be enough to produce a toxic effect in a child.
- Art Hansen Unfortunately through my 25 years of education Ive seen way too many overdoses in schools. One in particular a couple of years ago where a student was given a prescription patch, he put this patch on his tongue during class, and he started feeling ill. The kid that gave him the patch quickly took him out, trying to get him home. He collapsed and had a severe overdose. I sat there and watched him convulse and seize for about 15 minutes.
- Representative Mike Morley: Are these products in any way useful for people who are trying to get off of smoking? I look at it and I say, Yeah, in fact, they dont look like candy to me. They look like a multi-level marketing, you know, alfalfa pills or something. They look gross (laughs). But the question, if someone was going down the road and had a craving to smoke, obviously I would prefer that if it would help them not smoke in their homes or cars with children inhaling those carcinogenic type fumes, and thats already here and thats already legal and thats already happening, would it not be a benefit to have an alternative that would maybe prevent that type of activity?
- Morley: I become concerned a little when we start to try to parent our parents.
Where some are legal and some are not, Im just trying to draw a distinction and say, Gosh, if you have an option to maybe not smoke if someones addicted and be able to sustain that behavior and [not be allowed for sale to anyone over 19] it would seem to be very much the same as any product.
- Rep. Francis Gibson: Lets just say its not a replacement for smoking. Youve talked about the nicotine being more powerful than a regular cigarette. What if thats what I want? Im an adult. Im over 19. I smoke cigarettes. Ive been told I cant smoke in parks, I cant smoke in restaurants, all the various areas where I cant smoke anymore. So now I want to get this. . . . What youre proposing is we just say Tough, youre not going to have that product in Utah. You talked about the flavors and though youve taken out the e-cigarette part youve left in the part where you cant have the flavoring whatever the flavorings are. We have fruit wine coolers. We have Mikes Hard Lemonade. All things that if you were to look at them as a kid or anyone else, these are very much alcoholic beverages. I realize that were talking about alcohol and cigarettes, but however were still not attacking that industry. But there are menthol flavored cigarettes. There are flavored cigarettes.
- Amy Sands wrongly implied that Washington was considering banning flavored products. She needs to stay more up-to-date on these issues.
- Amy Sands: Theres mountains of research to show that cigarette smoking will cause lung cancer, cancer in almost every organ of your body, and kill you. The same is true of these products. These are cancer-causing, toxic products. Theres no doubt all sorts of scientific research to prove that smokeless tobacco products like these addict and they kill.
- Rep Ray: Who you guys have heard from the most today are people that are being paid by the tobacco lobby to come up here and convince you one way.
- Rep Ray: We know that one third of kids who start using these are going to die at some point in their life from the use of tobacco.
- Rep. R. Curt Webb: Was it two years that we had the discussion about flavored malt beverages? This is déjà vu. The exact same arguments were given. They look like soda pop, they smell like soda pop, theyre packaged like soda pop, theyre available easily. So it seems like weve heard all these arguments before. We acknowledge that theyre dangerous, we know that theyre dangerous, but our choice in the end was not to ban them but to control how theyre sold. And the controls on how their sold is already in place for tobacco products. We did not ban those beverages. We just changed how theyre sold.
- Rep Webb: Youre asking us to go a step further and say they cant exist at all and responsible adults in a controlled purchasing situation would not be allowed to even have the product available to them.
- Dave Davis, President of Utah Retail Merchants Association, Utah Food Industry Association: There seems to be some feeling that if a product has flavor in it, that its designed for kids. And quite frankly, I dont know how all of you are, I enjoy flavors in things. I didnt lose my taste for flavor when I became 19 years old. . . . We as retailers stand in favor of regulating these products just like we do tobacco products making sure that theyre behind the counter, making sure that there are penalties imposed on retailers who sell these products to children, making sure that there are penalties imposed on youth who try to purchase these products
I would like to speak on behalf of the kids who perhaps have parents that smoke. Might it be beneficial to them to have their parent, rather than light up that cigarette in the car or around that child, pop one of these products and prevent the second-hand smoke and prevent the 4,000 some odd chemicals that are in a traditional cigarette?
- Dr. Tom Metcalfe general pediatrician who represents 580 pediatricians of the Utah chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics: These products are poisonous and deliver up to twice the nicotine a cigarette does 3 mg vs. 1.5 mg for a cigarette.
There is no solid evidence that these products actually help adults to quit smoking.
- Ben Ryan, second-year pediatric resident at Primary Childrens Hospital and co-director of Pediatricians Against Second-Hand Smoke: Talks about children eating keyboard keys and rubber bands. There were approximately 8700 ingestions of tobacco-containing products in 2009. 80% of those ingestions were in children under the age of 5. 90% of those ingestions were unintentional. 1 in 5 resulted in a visit to a health care facility.
One cigarette alone can kill a child.
- Representive Gradley G. Last: I get a little bit concerned about how we throw data around up here. Ive learned in the legislature that we use data to say anything we want on either side. Youve just given us information regarding 8700 ingestions, I think you said that was of tobacco. [Ryan says it contains all tobacco-containing products] So all those things youre talking about are things that are not specifically included in this bill? So those things will still be available for children. So the question I have is do you have any examples, and I dont care if this is nationwide or worldwide or whatever, of a child that has died because of products that specifically excluded, or included I guess, in this bill? [Ryan: I cant give you specific examples.]"
- Representative Bird: Dont we have the same problem with over the counter drugs, Tylenol, that kind of a thing? If a child gets too many of those dont they have the same issue? Should we not ban those as well? [directed Ryan]
- Jacinda Ross: Hello my name is Jacinda Ross and I am here personally to speak for the e-cigarette users. I know that some of the parts of the bill regarding that were taken out, but the flavoring is something that is very important to a lot of us. I havent seen the bills latest revisions, has the internet sales prohibition been taken out of the current bill? [Ryan appears to say the bill doesnt apply to e-cigs]. So basically my problem with taking out the ability to have a flavor in it is that that is one thing that really helps a lot of us to switch from smoking to using the e-cigarette. I myself Im an ex-smoker. I stopped using cigarettes and started using electronic cigarettes about six months ago. I cant even explain how much of a difference it made in my life to have that for me to be able to get off of the smoking. I personally use sweet flavors. I like sweet flavors. I use cherry flavor. I use orange flavor. I dont like the tobacco flavors that are available. Ive had 3 cigarettes. The first 2 months that I started using the e-cigarette I had 3 actual cigarettes. And the longer period that I used the e-cigarette, the more that I noticed with the real cigarette how awful it tasted. I have another friend who uses cinnamon flavored e-cigarettes, and he was a 3-pack-a-day smoker. He got an e-cigarette to help him cut down on his smoking. He didnt even intend to completely quit smoking, but after a week and a half, getting used to the cinnamon flavor caused it so that he didnt like the taste of actual cigarettes anymore and he stopped smoking completely as well. So this is just happening I dont think that just because something tastes good that it means children are going to be interested in it. I have 2 teenage sons myself, and the only interest they have in my e-cigarette is making sure that I keep using it so they dont have to deal with having smoke around them.
- Liz Zentner Utah PTA Health Commissioner: The problem is that a lethal dose of nicotine for children is 10 mg and one of those cartridges contains 500 to over 1000 mg. We are very worried about that.
Dont be fooled by the slick tactics of tobacco companies and lobbyists.
- Maddie Buckley (spelling?), student at West High School (98% sure it was West), 15 years old: If it wasnt bad for me, I would love to smoke. I love the way it smells. I love the way that my ex-boyfriend looked when he smoked. And honestly when I looked at these products I thought that they looked fantastic and I would love to try them.
when I took a survey for a youth group I work with named Teen Advocates Against Tobacco on these products, I had two friends who said in unison when I explained to them what an e-cigarette was, Wow, thats cool. I was asked questions about what kind of flavors they have because they kids actually wanted to try them. I know that this isnt exactly a statistic. [Note: A hilarious speech, complete with one of the representatives jokingly asking her to narc on her friends that smoke, drink, and/or do drugs]
- Rep. Gibson: I just wanted to make a comment. You made mention about Big Tobacco lobby. There are people that I have heard him that are not lobbyists. They are e-cigarette people that want the flavor. Granted, the tobacco lobby is in the room, theyre in the hallway, we know that, but there are a lot of citizens that dont like this as well.
- Rep. Jackie Biskupski: Id love nothing more than to pass this bill out, just to send a message to clean up your act. Wed love that. But I dont know if we have the votes. But I can say that the arguments around this table about allowing adults to make choices. Well, at what point are you going to legalize ......... so adults can make a choice about that? Come on. Were really facing a significant issue here. And if the tobacco industry wants to pick up ......... and start moving it, they probably could.
- Rep. Gage Froerer made motion to hold bill.
- Voted against 8-4.
- Rep. Ray after losing: "Thank you chair, we'll see you next year"
Thank you so much for speaking for all of us and making sure our voices were heard.
The FDA's "bootsrapping ron amok" (as Judge Leon called) it is not new with the e-cigarettes, so the suit that Lorillard and Reynolds have brought against the FDA to point out the conflicts of interest is a good step toward FORCING the FDA to take a less-biased look at tobacco Harm Reduction.
