Author: Staff Writer

Georgia Cops Cracking Down on Delta-8 Sales
A central Georgia vape shop is the latest business to be raided by authorities in relation to the sale of delta-8 THC products . Two store employees were charged as part of the crackdown. The proliferation of delta-8-THC products being sold outside dispensaries has prompted a patchwork of enforcement reactions and crackdowns in states with varied policies on cannabis, from South Carolina to Oregon.
Credit: Fotokitas
The Newnan Times-Herald reports that Coweta County authorities were tipped off that the store called Tobacco & Vapor was illegally selling THC products. An undercover officer bought gummies from the store that failed THC testing. A search warrant was later executed and authorities seized 554 suspected delta-8-THC edibles and 616 suspected delta-8-THC products other than edibles.
Two of the store’s employees were charged with drug crimes including narcotics possession. Delta-8-THC is a molecule that exists rarely in the cannabis plant but can be easily synthesized from cannabinoids extracted from legal hemp, prompting confusion over its legality. Delta-8 is not specifically banned in Georgia. Delta-8 will also provide a positive result in testing as current tests used by law enforcement cannot differentiate between delta-8-THC and delta-9-THC (which is illegal federally and in Georgia).
While hemp itself is federally legal (at or less than 0.3 percent THC), each state has different laws and restrictions regarding byproducts derived from hemp, including Delta-8. No products containing Delta-8 have been tested by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration or are FDA-approved. The 2018 Farm Bill, which legalized hemp and its byproducts, explicitly excluded delta-9-THC, also known as simply THC, the compound that produces the typical marijuana “high.” But because of the bill’s loophole, delta-8 seemingly remains legal.
Twelve states have completely banned delta-8 sales specifically. Those states include Alaska, Arkansas, Arizona, Colorado, Delaware, Kentucky, Idaho, Iowa, Mississippi, Montana, Rhode Island and Utah. New York has a proposed rule to ban Delta-8 products, which is under a comment period until July 19. California, Oregon, Vermont and Washington are in the process of enacting regulations for delta-8 products. Several other states are also considering bans. Florida’s language concerning delta-8, however, allows for the legal sale of delta-8 in that state.
In order to prosecute a business or individual for selling or possessing delta-8 products, the government has to prove that you knowingly possessed or distributed a schedule I controlled substance, specifically THC or marijuana. Georgia officials have been cracking down on delta-8 sales over the last year. In May, local law enforcement in the metro-Atlanta area executed search warrants at several stores and a warehouse belonging to a small business owner who operates a chain of vape shops. Police seized several products that allegedly contain delta-8.
June 28, 2021
E-Cigarette Tax Hike Clears German Upper House

Photo: Sebastian H
Germany’s upper house of parliament, the Bundesrat, on June 25 approved tobacco tax reform legislation, which includes tax hikes on both traditional cigarettes and next-generation products, reports the Berliner Zeitung.
In 2022 and 2023, the tobacco tax on a pack of 20 combustible cigarettes will increase by an average of €0.10 ($0.12) each year; in 2025 and 2026, it will go up by another €0.15 in each year. A pack of branded cigarettes currently costs around €7 in Germany, which last raised its tobacco taxes in 2015.
Manufacturers are likely to pass the higher taxes on to consumers.
Around one in four German adults regularly smokes cigarettes. Health activists had called for significantly higher tobacco tax hikes. The German Cancer Research Center, for example, said the rate would have to increase by a least 10 percent to make a significant dent in smoking. The increases approved by the Bundesrat amount to 3 and 4 percent, respectively.
Tobacco taxes earned Germany €14.7 billion in 2020. Without a tax increase, the tax authorities had forecast tobacco tax revenues of €14.1 billion for 2022; with the rules that have now been adopted, they anticipate almost €16 billion.
The tax increase disproportionally targets e-cigarettes and the consumables for tobacco heating devices—a feature that has attracted considerable criticism from the vapor industry and tobacco harm reduction advocates, who believe such products should be taxed comparatively lightly because they are believed to be less harmful than combustible cigarettes.
SPD politician Michael Schrodi rejected such criticism by pointing out that novel tobacco products have been taxed at low rates to date. “Now they are being taxed appropriately because they too are a health hazard and are potentially addictive,” he said.
June 28, 2021
Health Canada: Flavor Ban Could Boost Smoking

Photo: jedsadabodin
Health Canada has made a “startling admission” that its recent policy to ban the sale of flavored vapor products could contribute to a rise in cigarette consumption, reports Filter, a publication owned and operated by The Influence Foundation, a nonprofit organization that advocates for rational and compassionate approaches to drug use, drug policy and human rights.
Into its regulatory impact analysis statement on the intended flavor ban, Health Canada acknowledges that its legislation could lead to an increase in smoking, according to Filter.
“It is anticipated that some dual users who currently use flavored vaping products would not substitute their purchases with tobacco[-flavored] and mint/menthol-flavored vaping products. They would choose to purchase more cigarettes,” the statement reads.
“The statement is very direct. It’s basically saying, ‘We’re Health Canada, and we’re going to do something that kills Canadians,’” said David Sweanor, an industry expert and chair of the Advisory Board for the Centre for Health, Law, Policy and Ethics at the University of Ottawa.

“The statement is very direct. It’s basically saying, ‘We’re Health Canada, and we’re going to do something that kills Canadians.”
David Sweanor, chair of the Advisory Board for the Centre for Health, Law, Policy and Ethics at the University of Ottawa
Matt Culley, a board member of the U.S.-based CASAA, a consumer advocacy nonprofit that promotes smoke-free alternatives to combustible tobacco, said, “The fact that a government can brazenly admit their policy will lead to more smoking and death is wild. It really goes to show how demonized vaping remains.”
The policy appears to be at odds with Canada’s intention to reduce its smoking rate to 5 percent by 2030.
Our policies have not aligned with the country’s goals,” Darryl Tempest, the executive director and chief advocate of the Canadian Vaping Association (CVA), told Filter. “It is not a public policy that relates to adults or harm reduction or small businesses.”
The country amended its tobacco laws to include vaping products in 2018, and some Canadian provinces have already enacted their own flavor bans.
June 27, 2021
Connecticut Cannabis Bill Bans Vaping in Many Public Places
The new bill in Connecticut that legalizes cannabis comes with a surprise. The legislation also bans vaping in many public places. In addition to being banned in health care settings, restaurants, state buildings and more, vaping and smoking tobacco or marijuana will now be prohibited in hotels, motels and other places of lodging, as well as in correctional facilities and halfway houses.
Credit: Andy Dean
Additionally, in all places where vaping is prohibited it will be restricted not only indoors but also outside within 25 feet of a doorway, window or intake vent, according to the Hartford Courant. That means, for example, a restaurant worker who takes a smoke break outdoors will have to do so at a 25-foot distance from the building itself.
The full list of places where smoking is banned in Connecticut now includes:

Any building, rail platform or bus shelter operated by the state (with the exception of public housing)

Any health care institution

Any retail food establishment accessed by the general public

Any restaurant

Anywhere alcohol is sold

In or on the grounds of any school

In or on the grounds of any child care facility

In any elevator

In any hotel room

In any correctional facility or halfway house

In any college dormitory
Landlords and building managers will not be allowed to prohibit the possession or consumption of cannabis but will be allowed to ban residents from smoking it. Connecticut recently joined 18 other states in legalizing recreation cannabis, after a multi-year effort in the state legislature.
Marijuana possession will be legal in Connecticut as of July 1, while retail sales are likely to begin next year. The bill lets people from cities that have borne the brunt of the war on drugs qualify for expedited licenses, in an attempt to reverse disproportionate impacts of marijuana prohibition.
“We had a chance to learn from others and I think we got it right here in the state of Connecticut,” Gov. Ned Lamont said before signing the legislation. “We weren’t the first but we were the first to show we can get it right.”
June 27, 2021
Lawmakers Press Acting FDA Chief on Flavored Vapes
The acting US Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Dr. Janet Woodcock on Wednesday was pushed by members of the U.S. Congress to ban all flavored e-cigarettes, saying the sweet and fruity flavors are attracting too many children and teens.
Credit: Kurgu 128
However, Woodcock would not assure lawmakers on whether the agency plans to ban or otherwise limit the sale of flavored vapes later this year. The agency has until September 9 to decide. When pressed multiple times over the course of the hearing, Woodcock would not commit to denying premarket tobacco product applications (PMTAs) for flavored vaping products at this time, according to CNN.
“While I can’t predict the future, I think that might be likely. We also would have to, regardless, limit advertising and sales in targeting children and other practices,” Woodcock said, adding that the FDA will look at the scientific evidence. “As I have said already, I can’t prejudge the scientific,” she said, before being cut off.
During the House Oversight and Reform Committee hearing, Rep. Katie Porter asked if the FDA banned all flavored e-cigarettes, would less kids continue to vape, among those who have started. “If kids have the choices of any tasty flavor, they’re going to go for it, and I’m speaking to you from experience here as a mom of three school-aged kids,” Porter said. “If there were no watermelon snow cones, my kids are happy with blue raspberry. No blue raspberry? They’ll take mango. No mango? They’ll take strawberry. But if their only choice was a brown, tobacco-flavored snow cone, they are going to walk away.”
Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-IL), chairman of the Oversight Subcommittee on Economic and Consumer Policy, said after the hearing he felt Woodcock would do as Democratic members of Congress wished. “I am more optimistic than ever that Commissioner Woodcock will do the right thing and deny the premarket tobacco product applications (PMTA) for all flavored vaping products, and all high-nicotine vaping products,” Krishnamoorthi said in a statement.
Woodcock also suggested at the hearing that e-cigarette manufacturer Juul Labs Inc. played a significant role in creating a youth vaping epidemic. When asked if Juul was “the e-cigarette company most responsible for creating this epidemic.” Woodcock replied that it does “appear” to be the case.
Woodcock would also not commit to removing menthol-flavored e-cigarette products from the US market, even though she said she believes menthol flavoring could heighten the effects of nicotine.
“I was so pleased that you banned menthol combustible cigarettes, which was the right thing to do,” Krishnamoorthi said during the hearing. “Will you pledge to clear the market of menthol e-cigarettes?”
“I can’t prejudge our decisions,” Woodcock replied.
June 25, 2021
Senator Durbin Blasts FDA Over E-Cigarette Oversight
U.S Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin yesterday testified at a House Oversight and Government Reform Subcommittee on Economic and Consumer Policy hearing that focused on youth vaping and the role of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in regulating e-cigarette products.
During his testimony, Durbin blasted the shortcomings of the FDA’s tobacco oversight over the last several years and urged the agency to rectify its missteps and put public health and the safety of children at the forefront of its mission, according to a press release.
“Flavored e-cigarette products have exploded in popularity among our kids—nearly four million now vaping, a 361 percent increase in just eight years when only 800,000 kids were vaping,” Durbin said. “Who is the cop on the beat to whom we entrust our children? It’s the Food and Drug Administration. And this agency has been timid and reluctant for way too long.”
All e-cigarette manufacturers were required to submit Premarket Tobacco Product Applications (PMTAs) to FDA by September 9, 2020, in order to legally stay on the market. FDA is now evaluating those applications based upon a public health framework and is required to complete review by September 9, 2021. FDA’s decisions on the PMTA applications will determine the course of the youth vaping epidemic.
In his testimony, Durbin urged the FDA to finally apply the public health standard that Congress passed in 2009 under the Tobacco Control Act and evaluate whether a product can stay on the market if it is, “appropriate for the protection of public health.” Durbin said he feared the FDA will over-value the unproven potential benefit of cessation for adult smokers, while under-valuing the clear evidence and experience we’ve had over the past several years on how flavored products hook kids.
“Only four percent of adults use e-cigarettes [compared] to 20 percent of high-school students. Kids who never would have picked up a tobacco product are vaping. It’s simple: any product with a history of increasing youth use must be rejected by FDA—especially flavored products that we know hooks the kids. This is the Super Bowl for the FDA’s tobacco effort and I’m afraid they aren’t ready for primetime. I hope they prove me wrong,” Durbin said.
Durbin went on to describe how despite promises from the Trump Administration to crack down on kid-friendly e-cigarette flavors, the FDA still left loopholes that have been exploited by the vaping industry to continue to hook kids onto new and illegal products.
“The result? Kids migrated…to the products that remained unregulated on the market: menthol flavored e-cigarettes and disposable vaping products. The use of disposable e-cigarettes… which were exempted from FDA’s January 2020 action, increased 1,000 percent last year. Make no mistake: kids get it. If we don’t take this seriously they will find those loopholes continue their addiction,” Durbin said. “And because FDA allowed menthol-flavored cartridges from JUUL and others to stay on the market, their use…increased from 11 percent to 62 percent of the [cartridge] market. Another failure by the FDA.”
June 24, 2021
CBP Atlanta Seizes Nearly 20,000 Counterfeit Vape Pens
U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officers last week seized nearly 20,000 flavored vape pens worth nearly $600,000 in Atlanta. According to the agency, last Wednesday, CBP Atlanta officers found 66 boxes of “Ricky and Morty” branded vape pens and e-cigarettes as they were inspecting a shipment and suspected the items violated copyright and trademark law.
Credit: CBP
The vape pens, which originated in a shipment from China, were to be distributed across Georgia, according to a statement. CBP contacted Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. and confirmed they hadn’t licensed their copyright of the animated series for vape pens. Officers ultimately seized the 19,800 vape pens with an estimated retail price of over $590,00.
“One of our primary missions is to intercept merchandise that could pose a serious health risk to the consumer, but this shipment of counterfeit vape pens violated Intellectual Property Rights,” said Paula Rivera, Atlanta’s CBP port director. “CBP collaborates with many government agencies to enforce laws to protect the health and safety of the consumer and our communities.”
In January, CBP Chicago seized 50,000 illegal “Rick and Morty” vape pens. CBP says each year, they seize millions of counterfeit goods that could otherwise hurt the U.S. economy, threaten consumers and fund criminal activity. Counterfeit items are often sold in underground outlets or on third-party e-commerce sites, according to CBP. Consumers might think they’re buying a genuine product but are left with a poor-quality item.
Last year, CBP seized nearly $1.3 billion worth of goods that violated intellectual property rights. The FDA announced an increased enforcement priority of electronic nicotine delivery systems, and issued detailed guidance to the industry of these new enforcement priorities that regulate the unauthorized importation of tobacco products.
CBP provides basic import information about admissibility requirements and the clearance process for e-commerce goods and encourages buyers to confirm that their purchases and the importation of those purchases comply with any state and federal import regulations.
CBP conducts operations at ports of entry throughout the United States, and regularly screens arriving international passengers and cargo for narcotics, weapons, and other restricted or prohibited products. CBP strives to serve as the premier law enforcement agency enhancing the Nation’s safety, security, and prosperity through collaboration, innovation, and integration.
June 24, 2021
Think Tank to Debate COP9 Impact on Vapers
The U.K. Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) will host a discussion today on the impact of the World Health Organization’s ninth Conference of the Parties (COP9) to the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC), which is scheduled to take place on Nov. 21 in the Netherlands.
The COP is the supreme decision-making body of the FCTC, where all parties to the FCTC meet biennially to review the implementation of the convention and adopt the new guidance. For the first time since leaving the European Union, in November 2021, the U.K. will send a delegation to the COP.
According to the IEA, COP9 poses a significant threat to the U.K.’s approach to harm reduction policy. “The WHO is increasingly, and against the clear evidence, positioning itself as an enemy of vaping,” the think tank states on its website. “The U.K. is a world leader in tobacco harm reduction, and a significant reason for this is our comparatively liberal approach to vaping products and e-cigarettes.”
Participants in the IEA forum will discuss who represents the U.K. at COP, how decisions are reached, the impact of these decisions on the U.K.’s harm reduction progress and the country’s 2030 smoke-free target, among other topics.
Speakers includes IEA Director General Mark Littlewood (chair), Matt Ridley (vice-chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Vaping), Christopher Snowdon (IEA head of lifestyle economics) and Louis Houlbrooke (NZ Taxpayers Union).
The discussion can be followed live on the screen or here.
June 24, 2021
Altria Execs Scorn Company’s Vapor Products During Trial

Photo: Paul Brady | Dreamstime.com
Altria Group Executives have been describing in detail their failure to come up with a marketable vapor product during an antitrust trial, reports The Wall Street Journal. Products leaked, generated high formaldehyde levels and lacked the nicotine smokers were looking for, according to their testimonies.
In April 2020, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) sued to unwind Altria’s 35 percent interest in Juul Labs, which the cigarette maker acquired in December 2018 for $12.8 billion.
A key question at trial is why Altria ended production of its own e-cigarettes in late 2018, shortly before announcing its investment in Juul.
Altria in October 2018 announced it was halting the sale of its pod-based and fruity-flavored e-cigarettes in response to a call by the Food and Drug Administration for e-cigarette makers to help stem a surge in vaping among children and teens. Then in December of that year, two weeks before the Juul agreement was signed, Altria pulled its remaining e-cigarettes off the market.
The FTC alleges Altria did so because of an illegal side deal in which it agreed to close its own e-cigarette business so it could take a stake in Juul. Altria and Juul both deny they had any such agreement.
Altria says it halted its e-cigarette sales amid pressure from regulators to curb youth use and an internal reckoning about the company’s inability to develop a successful vaping product. Juul says it didn’t see Altria’s e-cigarettes as a threat, didn’t ask Altria to shelve them and was surprised when Altria did so.
Juul and Altria argue that since the deal was struck, competition in the e-cigarette market has increased not decreased. Juul’s market share has fallen as have e-cigarette prices.
The FTC is seeking to force Altria to divest its stake and terminate the companies’ noncompete agreement. The case is being heard by an administrative law judge, who will make an initial decision; the agency’s commissioners will then vote on the matter.
June 24, 2021
House Committee to Question Acting FDA Leader Today
Acting FDA Commissioner Janet Woodcock is set to testify before a House subcommittee on Wednesday morning about youth vaping. Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi, chair of the panel, plans to press Woodcock to do more to stop kids from vaping and becoming addicted to nicotine.
“We still have a youth vaping epidemic, even amidst our pandemic,” said Krishnamoorthi, in a story for Yahoo Finance.
Krishnamoorthi has been an advocate for cracking down on the vaping industry over the past several years. In 2019, amid an outbreak of vaping-related illness linked to black market THC products not nicotine, there was bipartisan support for a crackdown — leading the Trump administration to issue a vaping flavor ban in an effort to curb teenage use.
The ban covered flavors that critics argued targeted children — like fruit, mint and candy flavors — but allowed menthol and tobacco flavors to remain legal. The ban only applied to cartridges or pre-filled pod devices, like the ones sold by Juul, not disposable e-cigarettes. Some critics argued the move wasn’t enough.
“You’ve got to get rid of all the flavors. Secondly, you have to make sure that disposable cigarettes are subject to the same flavor ban that all other products are subject to — and then third, we have to regulate the nicotine content,” said Krishnamoorthi. “These vapes that are currently on the market are so addictive.”
June 23, 2021