The FDA has not authorized a single e-cigarette for sale and denied more than a million vape products from the market.
The U.S. e-cigarette market is rapidly transforming—but not in a good way. Once a place of dynamic competition where small and medium-sized businesses could thrive and offer smokers innovative and safer alternatives to cigarettes, the vape market is now in chaos and only the biggest players are set to survive.
Sept. 9 was the court-imposed deadline for the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to decide which e-cigarettes, if any, would be allowed to remain on the market and which would be banned. In the end, the FDA failed to authorize a single e-cigarette for sale and gave more than a million products outright denials upon the deadline. The agency says it needs more time to decide on the remaining products it hasn’t yet rejected.
Because of this, all e-cigarettes are now subject to FDA enforcement action. The consequences of this decision will be devastating for a once-thriving industry and a tragedy for the health of millions of Americans. Less than a week after the FDA’s deadline expired, the Cochrane Review, recognized as the gold standard for evidence-based medicine, concluded e-cigarettes were more effective in helping smokers quit than traditional nicotine replacement therapies.
Guy Bentley – Reason – 2021-09-22.
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