News

F.D.A. Will Propose New Regulations for E-Cigarettes

Thursday, April 24, 2014
New York Times

The Food and Drug Administration will propose sweeping new rules on Thursday that for the first time would extend its regulatory authority from cigarettes to electronic cigarettes, popular nicotine delivery devices that have grown into a multibillion-dollar business with virtually no federal oversight or protections for American consumers.

The regulatory blueprint, with broad implications for public health, the tobacco industry and the nation’s 42 million smokers, would also cover pipe tobacco and cigars, tobacco products that have long slid under the regulatory radar and whose use has risen sharply in recent years. The new regulations would ban the sale of e-cigarettes, cigars and pipe tobacco to Americans under 18, and would require that people buying them show photo identification to prove their age, measures already mandated in a number of states.

Once finalized, the regulations will establish oversight of what has been a market free-for-all of products, including vials of liquid nicotine of varying quality and unknown provenance. It has taken the agency four years since Congress passed a major tobacco-control law in 2009 to get to this stage, and federal officials and advocates say it will take at least another year for the rules to take effect — and possibly significantly longer if affected companies sue to block them.

“If it takes more than a year to finalize this rule, the F.D.A. isn’t doing its job,” said Matthew Myers, president of the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, an advocacy group.

Thursday’s release of the blueprint — which is hundreds of pages long — is sure to set off a frantic lobbying effort in Washington as affected industries try to head off the costliest, most restrictive regulations.

Members of the Smoke Free Alternatives Trade Association, one of the e-cigarette industry trade groups, descended on Washington in November, and reported holding nearly 50 meetings with congressional officials to help them “learn more about the negative impact inappropriate regulation could have on this nascent industry,” the group said in a statement.

The industry has several trade associations, and a number of them have met with Obama administration officials about the regulations over the past several months, according to public records and industry group statements.

F.D.A. officials gave journalists an outline of the new rules on Wednesday, but required that they not talk to industry or public health groups until after Thursday’s formal release of the document.