Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
The FDA Tried To Ban Kid-Friendly, Flavored Vaping Fluids Years Ago - What Stopped It?
Los Angeles Times: The FDA Tried To Ban Flavors Years Before The Vaping Outbreak. Top Obama Officials Nixed The Plan
Now, as a mysterious vaping-related lung disease has doctors and parents urging the nation’s 3.6 million young users to quit, many are finding that they physically can’t — they’re hooked. It’s exactly the kind of youth addiction crisis the Food and Drug Administration had warned of four years ago, when it tried to ban flavored fluids for e-cigarettes. If the FDA ban had gone through, the kid-friendly vaping liquids would have been pushed off store shelves. Instead, over the course of 46 days, a deluge of more than 100 tobacco industry lobbyists and small business advocates met with White House officials as they weighed whether to include the ban as part of a new tobacco control rule. (Baumgaertner, 10/1)
POLITICO Pro: Vaping Crisis Exposes Republican Divide Over Regulation
The vaping disease outbreak has put congressional Republicans in a bind, forcing them to choose between free market principles and the Trump administration’s plans to crack down on the industry. Many Republican lawmakers have viewed policies like banning flavored e-cigarette products as "nanny state" politics of the worst kind. But most have held their fire since President Donald Trump announced the ban, a response to the hundreds of hospitalizations and at least 13 deaths caused by vaping-linked lung illness, including among the rising population of vaping teens. (Owermohle and Ollstein, 9/30)
The New York Times: Police Crack Down On Vaping, Surfacing Stockpiles Of Illicit Cartridges
As health officials grapple with a public health crisis they are struggling to understand, police departments are in the midst of a swift crackdown on vaping products containing THC, the psychoactive ingredient in marijuana. In the Phoenix area, the authorities recently raided three homes over eight days, seizing hundreds of THC cartridges at each. In Wisconsin, detectives arrested two young brothers accused of running a large-scale THC cartridge assembly operation inside a condo. And in Nebraska, sheriff’s deputies found a stash of cartridges in a car parked at a truck stop. (Bosman and Smith, 10/1)
The Associated Press: Juul Stops Funding San Francisco Vaping Measure
Juul Labs Inc. announced Monday that it will stop supporting a ballot measure to overturn an anti-vaping law in San Francisco, effectively killing the campaign. The nation’s largest maker of e-cigarettes said it will end its support for Proposition C after donating nearly $19 million. It was virtually the only financial backer of the measure. “Based on that news, we have made the decision not to continue on with the campaign,” Yes on C said in a statement. However, the proposition will still appear on the November ballot. (10/1)
San Jose Mercury News: How Bay Area Cities Are Cracking Down On Vaping
The burgeoning push to put the brakes on e-cigarette sales started, as these vanguard movements often do, in San Francisco when the Board of Supervisors approved in June a ban on e-cigarette sales, just as health concerns over the practice were starting to ramp up. Since then, reports showing an alarming rise in vaping and e-cigarette use among teenagers have prompted a national debate — and increasingly panicked public health warnings, amid reports that hundreds of people have been sickened by mysterious lung illnesses suspected of being related to vaping. At least four states have now issued all-out bans on electronic cigarettes. (May, 9/30)
The Wall Street Journal: Vape-Shop Owners Sue Massachusetts Over Ban
The owners of six Massachusetts vape shops are suing the state over a new temporary ban on vaping-product sales, escalating the tension between retail businesses and public officials trying to address a nationwide public-health problem. (Kamp, 9/30)
