E-cigarette advocates and tobacco harm reduction advocates, as well as the FDA, have long promoted a 50% reduction in cigarette smoking as a positive outcome when assessing the value of e-cigarettes (recent example). The FDA’s use of this benchmark is particularly surprising because in 2021 FDA scientists published a meta-analysis of the effects of smokers reducingContinue reading “Replacing 50% of cigs with ecigs or HTP had no lung benefit”
Category Archives: FDA
More evidence that ecigs cause lung disease in youth like cigs; dual use is worse
Richa Mukerjee and colleagues’ new paper, “ENDS, cigarettes, and respiratory illness: Longitudinal associations among US youth,” adds strong evidence to the conclusion that e-cigarettes cause lung disease (bronchitis, pneumonia, or chronic cough) among young people (age 12-17). They used 6 years of longitudinal data (where you follow the same people forward in time) to measureContinue reading “More evidence that ecigs cause lung disease in youth like cigs; dual use is worse”
WHO issues important call to action on ecigs
The World Health Organization has released a call to action and supporting technical note that provides detailed guidance for countries on how to battle the e-cigarette epidemic. The WHO both supports countries who have prohibited the import and sale of e-cigarettes and provides detailed evidence-based guidance for those who allow sale of e-cigarettes. The Biden WhiteContinue reading “WHO issues important call to action on ecigs”
Biden follows Obama and Trump by caving to industry pressure to delay menthol ban
Last week the Biden White House announced it was delaying a decision on the FDA’s well-reasoned product standards that would end the use of menthol in cigarettes and cigars, sparking outrage from leaders in the African American community: The White House is ignoring the real human cost of delay. Based on the Biden FDA’s analysis, everyContinue reading “Biden follows Obama and Trump by caving to industry pressure to delay menthol ban”
E-cigs associated with increased heart attacks; dual use is worse
Muhammad Talal Ashraf and his colleagues recently published “Association between e‑cigarette use and myocardial infarction: a systematic review and meta‑analysis” that pools the results of epidemiological studies and found that overall e-cigarette users are more likely to have had heart attacks than nonusers (odds ratio [OR] 1.44; 95% CI 1.22-1.74). They also found that dualContinue reading “E-cigs associated with increased heart attacks; dual use is worse”
Synthetic cooling agents make e-cigarettes more attractive and easier to inhale
Sales of “ice” e-cigarettes have been increasing rapidly, with US sales growing by more than 10 times from 2017 to 2021. In 2023 57.9% of US youth used ice e-cigarettes, often combined with other flavors (such as strawberry ice, frosted mint or tobacco ice). Ice e-cigarettes are being marketed around the world. The cooling effectContinue reading “Synthetic cooling agents make e-cigarettes more attractive and easier to inhale”
New national data shows kids using “ice” tobacco products; FDA needs to include them in pending menthol product standards
Last week the CDC and FDA published the 2023 statistics on youth tobacco use from the National Youth Tobacco Survey (FDA press release). The good news is that high school student overall tobacco use is down significantly compared to 2022 (from 16.5% to 12.6%), driven in large part by a drop in e-cigarette use (fromContinue reading “New national data shows kids using “ice” tobacco products; FDA needs to include them in pending menthol product standards”
First longitudinal evidence linking e-cig use and death
Shauna Goldberg Scott and her colleagues recently published the first longitudinal evidence (where people are followed forward in time, the strongest kind of epidemiological study) showing that e-cigarette use was associated with increased risk of death. Their paper, Demographic, Clinical, and Behavioral Factors Associated With Electronic Nicotine Delivery Systems Use in a Large Cohort inContinue reading “First longitudinal evidence linking e-cig use and death”
Netflix documentary Big Vape is worth watching
Like Jamie Ducharme’s book Big Vape, the four hour (in four episodes) Netflix documentary Big Vape tracks Juul’s development from an idea by two Stanford grad students to compete with Big Tobacco by creating a less dangerous product to replace cigarettes into part of the tobacco industry. It does a particularity good job of highlightingContinue reading “Netflix documentary Big Vape is worth watching”
FDA tiptoes toward enforcement of rules prohibiting unauthorized ecigs
It is currently illegal to sell almost every e-cigarette on the market. (The exceptions are a few e-cigarettes produced by RJ Reynolds, NJOY and Logic Technologies.) But FDA has been very slow to take strong formal enforcement actions. As of October 2022, FDA, working through the Department of Justice, had sought injunctions against 6 small-timeContinue reading “FDA tiptoes toward enforcement of rules prohibiting unauthorized ecigs”
Stanton Glantz blog 