Category: News This Week

It was like a flashback to 1994. In early February, The House Energy and Commerce oversight and investigations subcommittee grilled the CEOs of Juul Labs, Reynolds American and NJOY, as well as the presidents of Logic Technology Development and Fontem US. It was reminiscent of when, in 1994, the CEOs from seven major tobacco companies testified before Congress about the marketing tactics for tobacco products. The tension in the rooms was also similar.

For more than two hours, lawmakers on the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations asked questions ranging from marketing strategies to how to curb youth usage of these products. K.C. Crostwaite, CEO for Juul Labs, expressed his understanding of the serious need for companies to combat the uptick in youth use.

“I fully recognize that the opportunity for the millions of adult smokers who still use combustible cigarettes to have an alternative is at risk if we don’t address this issue,” K.C. Crosthwaite, Juul’s CEO, said. “We are focused on combating underage access because I know it puts it all at risk if we don’t make progress here.”

Legislators also wanted to understand the possible health effects vaping products pose to consumers and the role each company sees itself as playing in the ongoing effort to curb the nation’s uptick of youth use. Antoine Blonde, president of Fontem, said the company had a detailed youth access prevention program and maintained efforts to safeguard its products from youth.

“Fontem uses industry-standard online age-gating and age-verification mechanisms to prevent youth access to its products online,” Blonde said. “For example, for all purchases through our website, Fontem relies on industry-standard age-verification technology that compares a potential purchaser’s information against records of trusted data sources to verify the age of the purchaser.”

Blonde said Fontem recognizes that there “may be” bad actors in the marketplace who attempt to purchase bulk quantity of its products through e-commerce web sites in order to re-sell them (a practice often called strawman sales. “Fontem has always had policies in place to monitor for strawman sales and further is implementing a strict 4-Stage standard to monitor site access for any potential strawman purchases on its online platform,” Blonde explained. “This standard will track registered adult consumers’ monthly order frequency of pods from its online platform and will flag potential strawman sales.”

The companies are said to represent nearly 97 percent of the $19.3 billion U.S. e-cigarette market, according to Rep. Diana DeGette, chairwoman of the subcommittee. That data only includes convenience store sales, and many industry insiders say the figure is grossly inaccurate. Vape shop sales are not included in Nielsen data DeGette is citing.

“While consumers remain in the dark of the possible health consequences, these companies are making billions of dollars as they lure a new generation of young people into a lifetime of nicotine addiction,” DeGette, the chair of the oversight panel conducting the hearing, wrote in a press release.

The Trump administration’s partial ban on flavored e-cigarettes will go into effect at a minute after midnight Thursday.

The partial vape ban will impact most vapor products that use pre-filled pods, often called closed systems. Sales of fruit-, dessert- and mint- flavored pods will be banned; menthol and tobacco flavors will escape prohibition, according to an article in the Washington Post. The closed-pod products products, which were popularized by Juul Labs, have been widely available in convenience stores and in some vape shops.

The goal of the restrictions is to reduce youth vaping, which health officials say has reached epidemic levels, according to the story. The White House initially indicated it would ban even more products, but backed off amid objections from the vaping industry.

Stephen Hahn, the new U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) commissioner, defended the Trump administration’s partial e-cigarette ban but said he would take more actions to stop teen vaping if necessary.

The vaping ban will take effect on Feb. 6 and will ban the sale of most flavored cartridge-based vapor products, with the exception of menthol and tobacco flavors and single-use disposable products. Critics of the ban say it is too weak and fear youth will simply switch to the nonbanned products.

In his first interview with a national media outlet since his confirmation in December, Hahn told the Washington Post that the sales restrictions will target the products most popular with youth but that the FDA will closely monitor the situation, and if minors do switch to menthol-flavored products, the agency will take further action to curb vaping.

“The good thing about this policy is we have the ability without jumping through a lot of hoops to change our enforcement prioritization based on the data we are getting in,” Hahn said.

Advocates on both sides expressed skepticism at the FDA’s ability to quickly assess and respond to changing patterns in youth vaping. “There is zero percent chance the FDA can quickly respond to what they view as the risks associated with vaping because in three years, they have failed to implement sensible regulations,” said Paul Blair, director of strategic initiatives for Americans for Tax Reform.

“The agency’s record of monitoring the marketplace in real time is troubling,” said Matthew L. Myers, president of the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids. “There have been enormous changes with no evidence of their knowing it.”