Public health professor Michael Siegel explains the why the FDA and seven national anti-smoking groups lost their case for the banning of e-cigarettes:
The FDA failed in its efforts because the courts ruled that its jurisdiction over these products falls under the Tobacco Act, not the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (in the absence of therapeutic or drug claims made by electronic cigarette companies). The anti-smoking organizations failed in their efforts because the state legislatures which considered bans on electronic cigarettes were swayed by an outpouring of protest from vapers who testified that they would most likely return to cigarette smoking if these devices were taken off the market.
Dr. Gilbert Ross points out that global bans on e-cigarettes are widespread:
Lethally addictive cigarettes remain available on every street corner in Brussels and Atlanta while authorities denounce e-cigarettes (the product is already banned in Canada, Australia, and New Zealand). And while, as of today, e-cigarettes remain available in the European Union, a new Tobacco Products Directive is expected this year to call for a ban on e-cigarettes (while tightening the existing proscription on the nearly harmless type of Swedish smokeless, snus). Such measures would leave addicted smokers with few reliable means of quitting.
He adds:
An important fact, rarely discussed by “public health” gurus, is that the patches, gums, and drugs they recommend as “safe and effective” are all-too-often neither. Among the 46 million smokers in the United States, well over half say they want to quit, and more than one-third attempt to do so each year — but less than one-tenth succeed. Despite those sorry statistics, those in charge at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, the Food and Drug Administration, the World Health Organization, and the European Union health commission argue for sticking with currently approved cessation methods.
Earlier Dish on e-cigs here.
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