Washington (AFP) - US health authorities on Monday accused market-leading e-cigarette maker JUUL of ignoring the law and warned it to stop advertising itself as a less harmful alternative to smoking, noting in particular the company's youth outreach efforts.
The Food
and Drug Administration's move is the latest development in its ongoing
investigation of JUUL's practices, and comes amid a mysterious US outbreak of
severe lung disease linked to vaping that has claimed at least five lives.
Federal
officials have yet to identify a single substance behind the wave of illnesses,
which has affected hundreds of e-cigarette users and left several teens in
induced comas.
"The
law is clear that, before marketing tobacco products for reduced risk,
companies must demonstrate with scientific evidence that their specific product
does in fact pose less risk or is less harmful," said Ned Sharpless, the
FDA's acting head.
"JUUL
has ignored the law, and very concerningly, has made some of these statements
in school to our nation's youth," he added.
The warning
letter identified several problematic statements made by a JUUL representative
speaking at a school at an unspecified date, including that the product was
"much safer than cigarettes" and that "FDA would approve it any
day."
The
representative also told a student they "should mention JUUL to his friend
... because that's a safer alternative than smoking cigarettes, and it would be
better for the kid to use," the FDA said.
The agency
also expressed concern about the company's "Make the Switch" campaign
aimed at the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe, and has sought a written reply from
JUUL.
The
relative harm of vaping versus smoking is contested.
E-cigarette
users aren't exposed to the estimated 7,000 chemical constituents present in
combustible cigarettes, many of them cancer causing.
But the
liquid vapor they inhale contains highly addictive nicotine, and a variety of
other substances classed as "potentially harmful" in a landmark 2018
study compiled for Congress.
It might also
contain traces of metal from the coil used to heat the liquid or other parts of
the device, and experts had warned well before the current wave of illnesses in
the US that understanding the long-term effects might require decades more of
data.
As far as
the severe lung disease probe is concerned, New York state has said that
counterfeit cartridges containing cannabis products are the focus of its
investigation.
These
products contained vitamin E oil which is harmful when inhaled.
But federal
authorities stress that no single substance has yet been found to be behind all
the cases, and some of those who have fallen ill have reported only using
nicotine products, not THC.
Billionaire and former New York mayor Michael Bloomberg on Tuesday announced a $160 million campaign to ban flavored e-cigarettes in the United States following a spike in vaping deaths https://t.co/Yxs67WDczE— AFP news agency (@AFP) 10 september 2019
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