May 31, 2018
The best measure of the effectiveness of a tobacco control policy is how hard the tobacco companies fight it. This is an even better measure than fancy statistical analysis by people like me because, after all, nobody knows the tobacco business better than the tobacco companies.
The importance of local flavor bans like San Francisco Proposition E (supported by health groups, opposed by RJ Reynolds Tobacco) was reinforced in Illinois when the tobacco industry agreed to drop its opposition to a state Tobacco 21 law in exchange for preempting local flavor bans (and also prohibiting local governments from setting the tobacco age above 21, which is also remarkable).
The tobacco companies absolutely hate Tobacco 21 laws because they make it harder for them to market to kids. Their last minute compromise offer in Illinois says that they know that ending the sale of flavored tobacco products will make it even harder for them to recruit kids to nicotine addiction (and sustain industry profits).
May 30, 2018
The biological and clinical evidence that e-cigarettes are really bad for lungs has been rapidly piling up; now the first evidence linking e-cigarette use with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) has been presented. At the American Thoracic Society meeting in May 2018, Mario Perez and colleagues presented an analysis of the NIDA/FDA PATH study and found a strong link between e-cigarette use and COPD.
They compared having been told they were diagnosed with COPD (including COPD, chronic bronchitis, or emphysema) among current (some day or every day) with people who did not use e-cigarettes. They controlled for other tobacco product usage and secondhand smoke exposure using a technique called propensity score matching. Accounting for matched propensities, there were 1321 e-cigarette users and 1321 nonusers. E-cigarette users were about twice as likely to have COPD (odds ratio, 1.86; 95% CI, 1.22-2.83).
May 30, 2018
My colleagues and I just submitted this public comment to the FDA. The tracking number is 1k2-93fq-mfpc. A PDF (including all the footnotes) is here.
To minimize illicit tobacco trade, FDA should reject any partnership with the tobacco industry, reject industry estimates and exaggeration of illicit trade, and use the FCTC Protocol on Illicit Trade as a model to counter the supply side of illicit trade
May 24, 2018
In the battle over the future of San Francisco’s law ending the sale of flavored tobacco products (no all tobacco products, as the RJ Reynolds tobacco company campaign claims), RJR’s NO on Prop E campaign continues to talk about freedom and the health groups’ Yes on Prop E campaign talks about flavors attracting kids.
May 23, 2018
My colleagues and I just submitted this public comment to the FDA. The tracking number on Regulations.gov is 1k2-93bc-raaf and a PDF of the comment (which has all the footnotes) is available here.
FDA should implement its proposed rule that manufacturers must present scientific evidence demonstrating that any flavored tobacco product is appropriate for the protection of the public health before receiving marketing authorization to use that flavor