Teenage E-Cigarette Use Likely Gateway to Smoking

By Caroline Chen, Bloomberg News
E-cigarettes facing municipal bans and scrutiny by U.S. regulators received a new slap on the wrist from scientists: A report today suggests the devices may be a gateway to old-fashioned, cancer-causing smokes for teens.
Youths who reported ever using an e-cigarette had six times the odds of smoking a traditional cigarette than those who never tried the device, according to a study published today in the journal JAMA Pediatrics. E-cigarette use didn’t stop young smokers from partaking in regular cigarettes as well.
The global market for e-cigarettes may top $5 billion this year, according to Euromonitor International Ltd. estimates. Makers of the devices, including Altria Group Inc. (MO), the largest U.S. tobacco company, market them online and on TV, where traditional tobacco ads are banned, and some have added flavors such as bubble gum to the nicotine vapor that may have extra appeal for youths. That allure is why the U.S. Food and Drug Administration needs to restrict the devices, opponents say.
“The FDA needs to act now,” Vince Willmore, spokesman for the Washington-based Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, said in a telephone interview. “We think it’s overdue.”
Concerns about underage use of e-cigarettes were raised last year when the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta reported that use of the devices by youths doubled in 2012 from a year earlier.
“E-cigarettes are likely to be gateway devices for nicotine addiction among youth, opening up a whole new market for tobacco,” said Lauren Dutra, a post-doctoral fellow at the University of California at San Francisco and the report’s lead author. “We’re most worried about nicotine addiction initiation in youth.”

Enticing Product

E-cigarettes “are enticing for kids,” said Donovan Robinson, dean of students at Chicago’s Lincoln Park High School. He said today’s findings weren’t surprising. “They’ll say, ‘Hey, now let’s try the real thing.’”
Children in middle and high school, the target of the research, don’t think about health consequences, he said.
“Everything is a fad with teenagers,” Robinson said. They use e-cigarettes “because it looks cool. Teenagers see somebody doing something cool, and they want to do it.”
The latest research analyzed data from the 2011 and 2012 National Youth Tobacco Survey, conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Almost 40,000 middle and high school students from about 200 schools across the U.S. participated in the survey. Students were asked about their frequency of use of e-cigarettes, conventional cigarettes, cigars, pipes, and other tobacco products.

No Tar

While battery-powered e-cigarettes enable the ingestion of heated nicotine, users avoid the tars, arsenic and other chemicals common in tobacco products that have been linked to cancer, supporters have said.
The study today shows correlation, not causation, said Cynthia Cabrera, executive director of Smoke-Free Alternatives Trade Association, the Washington-based e-cigarette association.
“I’ve yet to see any science that shows there’s a gateway effect,” Cabrera said in a telephone interview. “We want to work with facts and science, we don’t want to make knee-jerk decisions based on emotional responses.”
Cabrera warned against drawing inferences on teen use based on the use of flavors in e-cigarettes.
“We do know that thousands of people were able to switch over to vapor products because of the flavors,” she said in a telephone interview. “Would we deny people who were in a group who could die from tobacco to use flavors that helped them get off killer tobacco?”

Nicotine Effects

Opponents have countered that nicotine alone is so toxic it’s been used in the past as a pesticide. They say the health effects of nicotine, which has proven to be habit forming, are unclear and deserve more study. Until that’s done, they’ve said, advertising of the devices should be closely monitored to make sure it isn’t aimed at underage smokers.
“We’re concerned that the marketing for e-cigarettes risks re-glamorizing smoking” among youths who won’t make the distinction between electronic and conventional cigarettes, Willmore said.
In December, a billboard in Miami used Santa Claus to market e-cigarettes and in the recent Sports Illustrated bathing suit issue there was an ad for one of the devices “right in the middle of a bikini bottom,” he said.
“You couldn’t design an ad more appealing to a teenage boy,” Willmore said.

Pivotal Year

This is expected to a pivotal year for producers of electronic cigarettes, with all major tobacco companies either launching new products or expanding their e-cigarette sales exposure, said Kenneth Shea, a Bloomberg analyst. Altria, Reynolds American Inc. and Lorillard Inc. are all expected to pursue U.S. exposure for their e-cigarettes, while closely held Logic Technology Development LLC and Sottera Inc., the maker of the e-cigarette NJoy, try to keep pace, Shea wrote in a report this month.
While tobacco companies have been under the FDA’s watchful eye since Congress gave the agency authority over the $90 billion industry in 2009, e-cigarettes haven’t been subject to the same oversight. The agency is now in the process of readying new rules for the industry designed to establish clear manufacturing standards and set boundaries for how the products can be marketed.
Federal regulators aren’t the only government officials moving to control use of e-cigarettes. On March 4, the Los Angeles City Council voted to join New York and Chicago in banning the use of the electronic products in in workplaces, restaurants and many public areas.

Bans Criticized

The municipal restrictions were criticized by Miguel Martin, president of Logic Technology, the second-largest independent e-cigarette maker in the U.S. Localities should wait for the FDA to make its views known before taking action, Martin said in an interview before the council vote.
“I find it odd that everybody looks to the FDA for guidance on everything else, but because it’s politically expedient, they don’t on this,” Martin said.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-03-06/teenage-e-cigarette-use-likely-gateway-to-smoking.html

Researchers claim electronic cigarettes "gateway" to real smoking but experts unsure

ByRYAN JASLOW / CBS NEWS
A new study may confirm some fears health officials had about electronic cigarettes. Researchers found teens who use e-cigarettes may be more likely to become addicted to actual cigarettes, doctors at the University of California San Francisco reported on March 6 in JAMA Pediatrics.
“E-cigarettes are likely to be gateway devices for nicotine addiction among youth, opening up a whole new market for tobacco,” Dr. Lauren M. Dutra, a postdoctoral scholar at UCSF School of Medicine, said in a university press release.
But, the study did not definitively prove that young e-cigarette smokers turned to tobacco after smoking the products, since it examined two large data pools of teens in 2011 and 2012 rather than tracking the same people for two years. Some experts have questioned the conclusions drawn by researchers.
Part of the findings suggest kids who used the products also experimented with conventional cigarettes and weren’t any more likely to quit using them, as some proponents had suggested.
E-cigarettes are metallic tubes that allow liquid nicotine to be converted into an inhalable vapor without the use of combustion. The battery-powered devices look like pens or cigarettes, and can come in flavors including strawberry, licorice and chocolate.
Researchers looked at survey data collected from more than 17,000 middle and high school students in 2011 and more than 22,500 in 2012.
In 2011, 3.1 percent of adolescents said they tried an e-cig once and 1.1 percent were current users. By 2012, 6.5 percent of adolescents had tried the products and 2 percent were current users.
Ever using and current use of e-cigarettes increased odds of experimenting with conventional cigarettes, smoking at least 100 cigarettes (ever smoking), or smoking at least 100 cigarettes and smoking within the past 30 days (current smoking). Teens who smoked both conventional cigarettes and e-cigarettes smoked more cigarettes per day than non-e-cigarette users, they also found.
Teens who used e-cigarettes and conventional cigarettes were much less likely to have abstained from cigarettes in the past 30 days, 6 months or the last year, despite some proponents claiming it could be used to help people quit smoking, Dutra added.
“Our results suggest that e-cigarettes are not discouraging use of conventional cigarettes,” she said.
Product users however were more likely to say they planned to quit smoking real cigarettes in the next year compared to smokers who did not also use e-cigs.
Previously, the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention had reported upticks in the number of adolescents and adults using electronic cigarettesin recent years. Nationally, cigarette-smoking rates have fallen in adults.
“This rapid rise has stimulated a vigorous debate in the tobacco control community over the potential public health impact of (e-cigarettes) and about how best to regulate them,” wrote Dr. Frank J. Chaloupka, a professor of economics who directs the Health Policy Center at the University of Illinois at Chicago in an editorial published in the same issue.
The article highlights some of the concerns about the public health harms, he added, noting the doubling of ever use of e-cigarettes among teens between 2011 and 2012, and the reduced likelihood to stop smoking conventional cigarettes among the experimenters.
“While much remains to be learned about the public health benefits and/or consequences of (e-cigarettes) use, their exponential growth in recent years, including their rapid uptake among youths, makes it clear that policy makers need to act quickly,” he wrote.
The Food and Drug Administration does not currently regulate e-cigarettes unless they claim health benefits, such as getting people to quit smoking.The FDA has previously announced intentions to tighten regulation of the products.
However, some experts questioned the conclusion drawn by the authors that e-cigs could be a gateway to smoking the real thing.
“The data in this study do not allow many of the broad conclusions that it draws,” Thomas J. Glynn, a researcher at the American Cancer Society, told The New York Times.
“The authors seem to have an axe to grind,” Dr. Michael Siegal, a professor of community health sciences at Boston University School of Public Health who has previously spoken in favor of e-cigarettes, told Reuters. “I could equally argue that what this study shows is that people who are heavy smokers are attracted to e-cigarettes because they are looking to quit.”
Last September, 40 state attorneys general asked the federal government to tighten regulation, charging e-cigarettes are marketed to young people through its fruit and candy flavors and cartoon-like advertising.
New York City, Chicago and Los Angeles have banned e-cigarette uses in some public places, putting them in the same category of other tobacco products.
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/researchers-claim-electronic-cigarettes-gateway-to-real-smoking-but-experts-unsure/

Teens Who Try E-Cigarettes Are More Likely To Try Tobacco, Too

By Patty Neighmond, NPR
While electronic cigarettes may be marketed as alternatives that will keep teenagers away from tobacco, a study suggests that may not be the case.
Trying e-cigarettes increased the odds that a teenager would also try tobacco cigarettes and become regular smokers, the study found. Those who said they had ever used an e-cigarette were six times more likely to try tobacco than ones who had never tried the e-cig.
Researchers from the Center for Tobacco Research and Education at the University of California, San Francisco, analyzed data from the 2011 and 2012 National Youth Tobacco Survey, a federal questionnaire administered to students in grades 6 through 12 in middle and high schools nationwide. It asked teenagers whether they smoked electronic or tobacco cigarettes or both.

The survey found that students’ use of electronic cigarettes doubled from 3.3 percent to 6.8 percent in 2011 and 2012. But the number of smokers declined only slightly, from 5 percent to 2011 to 4 percent in 2012.
Teenagers who smoked were more likely to use e-cigarettes, and vice versa. In 2012, 57 percent of those who had tried cigarettes had also tried e-cigarettes. And 26 percent of current smokers used e-cigs as well. By contrast, 4 percent of teens who had never smoked had tried e-cigs, and 1 percent said they use them currently.
E-cigarettes don’t burn tobacco. Instead, a battery heats up liquid nicotine and turns it into a vapor that’s inhaled into the lungs.
Director Dr. Tom Frieden, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, has called the rise of e-cigarette use among teenagers “alarming,” because nicotine is still an addictive drug. Frieden also has expressed concern that electronic cigarettes may be a gateway to tobacco cigarettes.

“The adolescent human brain may be particularly vulnerable to the effects of nicotine because it is still developing,” the authors write. Their study was published Thursday in the journal JAMA Pediatrics.
The study is one of the first to try to get a grip on how e-cigarettes affect tobacco use. It couldn’t look at whether e-cig use caused tobacco use, or vice versa, or why teenagers decided to use the products. And it doesn’t answer the question of whether teenagers used e-cigarettes in order to avoid tobacco.
Although cigarette makers deny they target teenage customers, researchers say the companies aggressively market glamorous and sexy images that appeal to a teenager’s sense of rebellion and tendency toward risky behavior. Those same tactics are now being used for e-cigarette ads, tobacco control advocates say.
The electronic versions also come in a variety of flavors like strawberry, watermelon and licorice. There are far more restrictions on tobacco cigarettes including a ban on offering sweet or fruity flavors, as well as restrictions on advertising and sales to minors. The Food and Drug Administraiton is currently considering whether and how much to regulate electronic cigarettes.
http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2014/03/06/286416362/teens-who-try-e-cigarettes-are-more-likely-to-try-tobacco-too

5 Things to Know About E-Cigarettes

By , ABC News

Los Angeles is the latest city to outlaw e-cigarette smoking in some public places.

The L.A. City Council voted 14-0 in favor of the “vaping” ban, following in the footsteps of New York City and Chicago.

E-Cigarette Health Row Catches Fire

The electronic cigarette was invented in the 1960s, but it didn’t really take off until a decade ago. The Tobacco Vapor Electronic Cigarette Association now estimates that roughly 4 million Americans use the battery-powered cigs.

Here’s a look at the e-smoke trend: the good, the bad and the unknown.

What are e-cigarettes?

E-cigarettes are battery operated nicotine inhalers that consist of a rechargeable lithium battery, a cartridge called a cartomizer and an LED that lights up at the end when you puff on the e-cigarette to simulate the burn of a tobacco cigarette. The cartomizer is filled with an e-liquid that typically contains the chemical propylene glycol along with nicotine, flavoring and other additives.

The device works much like a miniature version of the smoke machines that operate behind rock bands. When you “vape” — that’s the term for puffing on an e-cig — a heating element boils the e-liquid until it produces a vapor. A device creates the same amount of vapor no matter how hard you puff until the battery or e-liquid runs down.

How much do they cost?

Starter kits usually run between $30 and $100. The estimated cost of replacement cartridges is about $600, compared with the more than $1,000 a year it costs to feed a pack-a-day tobacco cigarette habit, according to the Tobacco Vapor Electronic Cigarette Association. Discount coupons and promotional codes are available online.

Are e-cigarettes regulated?

The decision in a 2011 federal court case gives the Food and Drug Administration the authority to regulate e-smokes under existing tobacco laws rather than as a medication or medical device, presumably because they deliver nicotine, which is derived from tobacco. The agency has hinted it will begin to regulate e-smokes as soon as this year but so far, the only action the agency has taken is issuing a letter in 2010 to electronic cigarette distributors warning them to cease making various unsubstantiated marketing claims.

For now, the devices remain uncontrolled by any governmental agency, a fact that worries experts like Erika Seward, the assistant vice president of national advocacy for the American Lung Association.

“With e-cigarettes, we see a new product within the same industry — tobacco — using the same old tactics to glamorize their products,” she said. “They use candy and fruit flavors to hook kids, they make implied health claims to encourage smokers to switch to their product instead of quitting all together, and they sponsor research to use that as a front for their claims.”

Thomas Kiklas, co-owner of e-cigarette maker inLife and co-founder of the Tobacco Vapor Electronic Cigarette Association, countered that the device performs the same essential function as a tobacco cigarette but with far fewer toxins. He said he would welcome any independent study of the products to prove how safe they are compared to traditional smokes.

The number of e-smokers is expected to quadruple in the next few years as smokers move away from the centuries old tobacco cigarette so there is certainly no lack of subjects,” he said.

What are the health risks of vaping?

The jury is out. The phenomenon of vaping is so new that science has barely had a chance to catch up on questions of safety, but some initial small studies have begun to highlight the pros and cons.

The most widely publicized study into the safety of e-cigarettes was done when researchers analyzed two leading brands and concluded the devices did contain trace elements of hazardous compounds, including a chemical which is the main ingredient found in antifreeze. But Kiklas, whose brand of e-cigarettes were not included in the study, pointed out that the FDA report found nine contaminates versus the 11,000 contained in a tobacco cigarette and noted that the level of toxicity was shown to be far lower than those of tobacco cigarettes.

However, Seward said because e-cigarettes remain unregulated, it’s impossible to draw conclusions about all the brands based on an analysis of two.

“To say they are all safe because a few have been shown to contain fewer toxins is troubling,” she said. “We also don’t know how harmful trace levels can be.”

Thomas Glynn, the director of science and trends at the American Cancer Society, said there were always risks when one inhaled anything other than fresh, clean air, but he said there was a great likelihood that e-cigarettes would prove considerably less harmful than traditional smokes, at least in the short term.

“As for long-term effects, we don’t know what happens when you breathe the vapor into the lungs regularly,” Glynn said. “No one knows the answer to that.”

Do e-cigarettes help tobacco smokers quit?

Because they preserve the hand-to-mouth ritual of smoking, Kiklas said e-cigarettes might help transform a smoker’s harmful tobacco habits to a potentially less harmful e-smoking habit. As of yet, though, little evidence exists to support this theory.

In a first of its kind study published last week in the medical journal Lancet, researchers compared e-cigarettes to nicotine patches and other smoking cessation methods and found them statistically comparable in helping smokers quit over a six-month period. For this reason, Glynn said he viewed the devices as promising though probably no magic bullet. For now, FDA regulations forbid e-cigarette marketers from touting their devices as a way to kick the habit.

Seward said many of her worries center on e-cigarettes being a gateway to smoking, given that many popular brands come in flavors and colors that seem designed to appeal to a younger generation of smokers.

“We’re concerned about the potential for kids to start a lifetime of nicotine use by starting with e-cigarettes,” she said.

Though the National Association of Attorneys General today called on the FDA to immediately regulate the sale and advertising of electronic cigarettes, there were no federal age restrictions to prevent kids from obtaining e-cigarettes. Most e-cigarette companies voluntarily do not sell to minors yet vaping among young people is on the rise.

A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study found nearly 1.8 million young people had tried e-cigarettes and the number of U.S. middle and high school students e-smokers doubled between 2011 and 2012.

A version of this story previously ran on ABCNews.com.

http://abcnews.go.com/Health/things-cigarettes/story?id=22782568#5

E-Cigarettes, by Other Names, Lure Young and Worry Experts

By , NY Times

SAN FRANCISCO — Olivia Zacks, 17, recently took a drag of peach-flavored vapor from a device that most people would call an e-cigarette.

But Ms. Zacks, a high school senior, does not call it that. In fact, she insists she has never even tried an e-cigarette. Like many teenagers, Ms. Zacks calls such products “hookah pens” or “e-hookahs” or “vape pipes.”

These devices are part of a subgenre of the fast-growing e-cigarette market and are being shrewdly marketed to avoid the stigma associated with cigarettes of any kind. The products, which are exploding in popularity, come in a rainbow of colors and candy-sweet flavors but, beneath the surface, they are often virtually identical to e-cigarettes, right down to their addictive nicotine and unregulated swirl of other chemicals.

The emergence of e-hookahs and their ilk is frustrating public health officials who are already struggling to measure the spread of e-cigarettes, particularly among young people. The new products and new names have health authorities wondering if they are significantly underestimating use because they are asking the wrong questions when they survey people about e-cigarettes.

Marketers of e-hookahs and hookah pens say they are not trying to reach young people. But they do say that they want to reach an audience that wants no part of e-cigarettes and that their customers prefer the association with traditional hookahs, or water pipes.

“The technology and hardware is the same,” said Adam Querbach, head of sales and marketing for Romman Inc. of Austin, Tex., which operates several websites that sell hookahs as well as e-cigarettes and e-hookahs. “A lot of the difference is branding.”

Sales of e-hookahs have grown “exponentially” in the last 18 months, Mr. Querbach said.

Public health authorities worry that people are being drawn to products that intentionally avoid the term “e-cigarette.” Of particular concern is use among teenagers, many of whom appear to view e-cigarettes and e-hookahs as entirely different products when, for all practical purposes, they are often indistinguishable.

Indeed, public health officials warn that they may be misjudging the use of such products — whatever they are called — partly because of semantics. A survey by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that 10 percent of high school students nationwide said that they had tried e-cigarettes in 2012, double the year before. But the C.D.C. conceded it might have asked the wrong question: Many young people say they have not and will not use an e-cigarette but do say they have tried hookah pens, e-hookahs or vaping pens.

The C.D.C. is sending a tobacco-use survey to 20,000 students nationwide that asks about e-cigarette experimentation but does not identify the devices by other names. The state of California, through a nonprofit partner called WestEd, is asking virtually the same question of 400,000 students.

Brian King, senior adviser to the Office on Smoking and Health at the C.D.C., said the agency was aware of the language problem. “The use of hookah pens could lead us to underestimate overall use of nicotine-delivery devices,” he said. A similar problem occurred when certain smokeless tobacco products were marketed as snus.

Other health officials are more blunt.

“Asking about e-cigarettes is a waste of time. Twelve months ago, that was the question to be asking,” said Janine Saunders, head of tobacco use prevention education in Alameda County in Northern California.

In October, Ms. Saunders convened a student advisory board to discuss how to approach “e-cigs.” “They said: ‘What’s an e-cig?’ “ Ms. Saunders recalled, and she showed what she meant. “They said: ‘That’s a vape pen.’ “

Health officials worry that such views will lead to increased nicotine use and, possibly, prompt some people to graduate to cigarettes. The Food and Drug Administration is preparing to issue regulations that would give the agency control over e-cigarettes, which have grown explosively virtually free of any federal oversight. Sales of e-cigarettes more than doubled last year from 2012, to $1.7 billion, according to Wells Fargo Securities, and in the next decade, consumption of e-cigarettes could outstrip that of conventional cigarettes. The number of stores that sell them has quadrupled in just the last year, according to the Smoke Free Alternatives Trade Association, an e-cigarette industry trade group.

The emergence of hookah pens and other products and nicknames seems to suggest the market is growing well beyond smokers. Ms. Zacks was among more than 300 Bay Area high school students who attended a conference focused on health issues last month on the campus of the University of California, Berkeley. Many students talked about wide use of e-hookahs or vaping pens — saying as many as half of their classmates had tried one — but said that there was little use of e-cigarettes.

Ms. Zacks said the devices were popular at her high school here. “E-cigarettes are for people trying to quit smoking,” she said, explaining her understanding of the distinction. “Hookah pens are for people doing tricks, like blowing smoke rings.”

James Hennessey, a sophomore at Drake High School in San Anselmo, Calif., who has tried a hookah pen several times, said e-hookahs were less dangerous than e-cigarettes. He and several Drake students estimated that 60 percent of their classmates had tried the devices, that they could be purchased easily in local stores, and that they often were present at parties or when people were hanging out.

“E-cigarettes have nicotine and hookah pens just have water vapor and flavor,” said Andrew Hamilton, a senior from Drake.

Actually, it is possible for e-cigarettes or e-hookah devices to vary in nicotine content, and even to have no nicotine. Mr. Querbach at Romman said that 75 percent of the demand initially was for liquids with no nicotine, but that makers of the liquids were expanding their nicotine offerings. Often, nicotine is precisely the point, along with flavor.

Take, for example, the offerings of a store in San Francisco called King Kush Clothing Plus, where high school students say they sometimes buy their electronic inhalers. On a counter near the back, where tobacco products are sold, are several racks of flavored liquids that can be used to refill e-cigarettes or hookah pens. The flavors include cinnamon apple, banana nut bread, vanilla cupcake, chocolate candy bar and coconut bomb. They range in nicotine concentration from zero to 24 milligrams — about as much as a pack of 20 ordinary cigarettes — but most of the products have some nicotine. To use the refills, it is necessary to buy a hookah pen, which vary widely in price — around $20 and upward.

It is also possible to buy disposable versions, whether e-cigarettes or hookah pens, that vary in nicotine content and flavor. At King Kush, the Atmos ice lemonade-flavored disposable electronic portable hookah promises 0.6 percent nicotine and 600 puffs before it expires.

Emily Anne McDonald, an anthropologist at the University of California, San Francisco who is studying e-cigarette use among young people, said the lack of public education about the breadth of nicotine-vapor products was creating a vacuum “so that young adults are getting information from marketing and from each other.”

“We need to understand what people are calling these before we send out large surveys,” Dr. McDonald said. Otherwise the responses do not reflect reality, “and then you’re back to the beginning.”

Doctor Wants Lawmakers to Classify E-Cigarettes as Tobacco

By: WILX NEWS 10
Michigan’s top doctor is calling on state lawmakers to classify e-cigarettes as tobacco products. Legislation currently in the Senate would make it a crime to sell the devices to minors. But Dr. Matthew Davis, Chief Medical Executive with the Michigan Department of Community Health says the bi-partisan package of bills doesn’t go far enough.
E-cigarettes are electronic devices that heat up liquid and allow the user to inhale a vapor. Davis says, “What we’re seeing is that kids are trying these in higher and higher numbers and many parents are concerned. We know this from national research, that their kids may get addicted to nicotine and end up using traditional cigarettes down the road.” Republican Senator Rick Jones of Grand Ledge agrees. “We have a problem in this state. Any 10 year-old can go in and buy electronic cigarettes. Some are flavored like root beer, orange, even cheesecake. and children are getting addicted to nicotine.”
Jones has sponsored Senate Bills 667 & 668. The legislation would make it immediately illegal for retailers to sell e-cigarettes to minors. But Davis says, that isn’t good enough. He wants lawmakers to protect everyone from the dangers of e-cigarettes by taxing them, and banning them from restaurants, bars and other public places. Davis says, “After all, liquid in e-cigarettes is extracted from tobacco and so therefore, they are essentially tobacco products . And certainly tobacco-derived products, it would make sense to use the existing regulations that we have about tobacco products and classify e-cigarettes under that existing regulation.” Jones says, he’s more concerned about limiting access to children. “I understand that they want the moon, and they want to be able to tax these devices just like cigarettes but that will have to wait for an FDA decision. Anything the federal government does will override Michigan law so there is no problem.”
While retailers can sell e-cigarettes to anyone, many say they treat them just like cigarettes and don’t sell to minors. Many restaurants also ban the devices. The legislation is now in a Senate committee.
http://www.wilx.com/home/headlines/Doctor-Wants-Lawmakers-to-Classify-E-Cigarettes-as-Tobacco-248439351.html?ref=351

E-Cigarette Critics Worry New Ads Will Make 'Vaping' Cool For Kids

by Debbie Elliott, NPR
Electronic cigarette makers are getting bold with their advertising, using provocative new print ads and celebrity endorsements on TV. But public health advocates say these images are luring kids to hook them on nicotine.
The latest ad for blu eCigs, for example, which ran in the Sports Illustrated swimsuit edition, features an itsy bitsy bikini bottom emblazoned with the company name and includes the tagline “Slim. Charged. Ready to go.” You don’t see the model’s face. The frame is from pierced belly button to mid-thigh. It left Stan Glantz, a professor of medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, struggling for a delicate way to describe it.
“The advertising just hit a new high in terms of chutzpah,” says Glantz, director of the Center for Tobacco Control Research and Education. Using sex to sell cigarettes is nothing new, he says, and e-cigarettes are pushing the envelope because they’re unregulated.
“If the Obama administration were serious about protecting the public on public health, they would immediately move to clamp down on the way e-cigarettes are being advertised and apply the same rules that apply to cigarette advertising,” Glantz says.
Those rules include bans on sports sponsorships, cartoon characters, flavors and TV advertising.
Blu eCigs use a cartoon character named Mr. Cool in a television campaign. (Sound familiar? Some have noticed similarities between the ways the e-cigarette industry has marketed its product and how traditional tobacco companies have. Here, a House committee compares the two.)
Vince Willmore with the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids says these messages attract youth — especially the Sports Illustrated bikini ad.
“It’s going to appeal to teenage boys,” Willmore says.
Blu maker Lorillard has not responded to NPR’s requests for comment. Blu’s website asks if you are 18 to enter, and ads say “not for minors.”
Willmore says nonetheless, they re-glamorize smoking and threaten to reverse decades of progress in preventing kids from getting hooked.
“Kids may view them as something they can use that’s not going to harm their health without realizing that they contain very addictive nicotine,” Willmore says. “For kids, these products could serve as a gateway to nicotine addiction and even to regular cigarette smoking.”
A New Frontier
Electronic cigarettes don’t burn tobacco. They heat a nicotine-laced liquid and the smoker inhales vapor, not smoke.
After school at Woodrow Wilson High School in Washington, D.C., students say some of their peers use e-cigarettes. And that unlike smoking, “vaping” is perceived as something new and cool.
Thomas Mason, 16, thinks they’re beneficial. “And the e-cigarettes is like flavored nicotine, so as far as I think, I think that nicotine is supposed to help you stop smoking,” Mason says.
That perception worries Dr. Tom Frieden, director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which found that e-cigarette use among kids doubled last year. Frieden says youth are particularly susceptible to addiction and vulnerable to ads.
“What we’re seeing from the e-cigarette companies is disgraceful. They’re working to get another generation of American kids addicted to nicotine,” he says.
Frieden says the Food and Drug Administration is working to regulate e-cigarettes and notes the first time it tried, the industry sued to stop it. He’s hopeful any new regulation would prohibit marketing that might result in kids trying them.
E-cigarette makers say that’s going too far.
“If you start pulling ads based on what children are going to do, there would be no alcohol advertising, there would be no condom advertising or any other types of advertising for that matter,” says Jason Cardiff, president of the e-cigarette company Cigirex. He says Cigirex targets adult smokers looking for an alternative.
“We think it’s very appropriate to be advertising in places that have been banned by a combustible tobacco cigarette,” Cardiff says.
Just five years ago, the industry was mostly small, independent companies. Now all the major cigarette makers are getting into the business. The latest is Altria, parent of Marlboro maker Philip Morris. Altria is about to launch its MarkTen e-cigarette nationally.
Spokesman David Sylvia says the company supports FDA regulation but says any new rules should not limit the industry’s ability to reach potential customers.
“Given the fact that it is a new and emerging category, it’s important to recognize that raising awareness for those adult tobacco consumers who are interested in these products is an important thing,” Sylvia says.
Interest in e-cigarettes is apparently already booming. It was a $2 billion industry last year and industry insiders say sales are on track to hit $5 billion this year.
http://www.npr.org/2014/03/03/284006424/e-cigarette-critics-worry-new-ads-will-make-vaping-cool-for-kids?utm_medium=Email&utm_source=share&utm_campaign=storyshare

U.S. Senators call for e-cigarettes advertising ban

​WASHINGTON – Last week U.S. Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA), chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee, joined Senators Barbara Boxer (D-CA), Dick Durbin (D-IL), Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) and Edward J. Markey (D-MA) in introducing the Protecting Children from Electronic Cigarette Advertising Act, a bill that seeks to prohibit the marketing of e-cigarettes to children and teens.
“When it comes to the marketing of e-cigarettes to children and teens, it’s ‘Joe Camel’ all over again,” said Harkin in a press release. “It is troubling that manufacturers of e-cigarettes — some of whom also make traditional cigarettes — are attempting to establish a new generation of nicotine addicts through aggressive marketing that often uses cartoons and sponsorship of music festivals and sporting events. This bill will take strong action to prohibit the advertising of e-cigarettes directed at young people and ensure that the FTC can take action against those who violate the law. While FDA regulation of these products remains critical, this legislation would complement oversight and regulation by the FDA, and ultimately help prevent e-cigarette manufacturers from targeting our children.”
“Tobacco companies advertising e-cigarettes — with flavors like bubblegum and strawberry — are clearly targeting young people with the intent of creating a new generation of smokers, and those that argue otherwise are being callously disingenuous,” Blumenthal said.
“We’ve made great strides educating young people about the dangers of smoking, and we cannot allow e-cigarettes to snuff out the progress we’ve made preventing nicotine addiction and its deadly consequences,” said Markey.
The senators noted in a press release that e-cigarettes are not subject to federal laws and regulations that apply to traditional cigarettes, including a ban on marketing to youth. The Protecting Children from Electronic Cigarette Advertising Act would permit the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to determine what constitutes marketing e-cigarettes to children, and would allow the FTC to work with states attorneys general to enforce the ban.
In December, Senators Harkin, Durbin, Boxer, Blumenthal, Markey and Sherrod Brown (D-OH) sent a letter urging the FTC to investigate the marketing practices of e-cigarette manufacturers.
http://www.nacsonline.com/News/Daily/Pages/ND0303141.aspx#.UxSdH0JdXuc

Health Minute: Doctors weigh in on e-cigarettes

(CNN) — Tobacco-less cigarettes called e-cigarettes are gaining popularity in this country.
They can help people quit smoking, but some fear they can get others hooked on nicotine.
Peter Chugaev has been smoking for 45 years and for the past 15 he’s been trying to quit.
“You have a cup of coffee, you go on the deck, you have a cigarette,” Chugaev said.
Now he’s turning to electronic cigarettes to try to quit. Users inhale, but there’s no smoke. Taking a puff triggers a heating coil, which warms up liquid nicotine, in a plastic filter, resulting in nicotine-filled vapor.
But hardcore smokers aren’t the only ones seeking out e-cigarettes.
Young people are as well and this has some health experts concerned because these products are not federally regulated and there is limited research on their safety.
Dr. Sharon Bergquist, with the Emory School of Medicine said, “The greatest concern is that between 2011 and 2012 the rate of use between middle school and high school kids has doubled.”
These products come in flavors that may appeal to young people.
Dr. Thomas Frieden, Director of the Centers for Disease Control says, “Well, there are not a lot of adults who would smoke a cotton candy e-cigarette.”
Health experts worry that once addicted to the nicotine in e-cigarettes, young people may branch out and try tobacco products.
Manufacturers say they don’t market to kids and maintain that electronic cigarettes are a good alternative to conventional cigarettes.
And for Peter, e-cigarettes seem to be helping. He is down from a pack a day of regular cigarettes to about half that and hopes to kick the habit by the end of the year.
http://fox44.com/news/health-minute-doctors-weigh-e-cigarettes

Fire officials issue warning about e-cigarette dangers

By Sam Wheeler, Mail Tribune
Electronic cigarettes may be safer for the lungs of smokers than the standard leaf-burning variety, some people believe, but Medford fire officials want people to know they can still cause fires.
E-cigs have caused minor fires at two Medford homes recently, Medford Fire-Rescue officials said.
Fire Marshal Greg Kleinberg said the lithium batteries used to power the nicotine vaporizers can explode if they overheat while charging.
Kleinberg said an overheating e-cigarette caused a mattress to catch fire at one local house, but the flames were quickly extinguished by a resident.
“If he didn’t do that right away, it would have been a different story. It would have been a building fire instead of just a small item on fire,” Kleinberg said.
On Wednesday, an e-cig exploded while being charged, sending bits of burning battery flying into the ceiling and walls, Kleinberg said. One hot piece of battery landed on a pillow, causing it to smolder and filling the house with smoke, he said.
Neither fire spread beyond the rooms where they started, but the potential for catastrophic damage was there, he said.
“Some of the batteries are failing in them or they are being overcharged,” Kleinberg said. “We just wanted to put a warning out there that people need to take precautions using some of these devices. Just unplug it when you go to bed. Make sure you have a working smoke alarm.”
He said e-cig users should follow the manufacture’s instructions concerning the devices.
“A lot of these devices are not really regulated right now; some of them are UL listed and some are not, some aren’t tested at all,” he said.
Most regulated electronic devices go through safety analysis conducted by Underwriter Laboratories or another nationally recognized testing laboratory before hitting the market.
Laws defining regulations and testing standards for electronic cigarettes are still in their infancy.
http://www.mailtribune.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20140301/NEWS/403010309