The Cole-Bishop Amendment killed in Congress

The Cole-Bishop Act was introduced to the House of Representatives as H.R.1136, The FDA Deeming Authority Clarification Act of 2017. It was first introduced on February 16th, and it would have challenged the FDA’s Deeming Rule by moving the grandfather date from 2007 to 2017, hence saving tens of thousands of products that are already on the market from the agency’s impossibly expensive licensing process.

Sadly for the millions of smokers who rely on the products for smoking cessation, the bill was killed by Democrats allied with some Republicans, said Gregory Conley, president of the American Vaping Association, said in a press release issued Monday afternoon.

“Democrats are setting themselves up to experience a reality check on vaping in the November 2018 mid-term elections,” warned Conley.

“The FDA’s deeming ban is set to take effect less than three months before Senate Democrats have some of their toughest election fights in years. Just as vapers helped re-elect Senator Ron Johnson, vapers will vote out Senators who stand by idly as harm reduction products are yanked from shelves.”

Amongst those in favour of this turn of events, was of course the infamous Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids. “By rejecting these special-interest giveaways to tobacco companies, this agreement preserves the FDA’s ability to protect kids from the huge assortment of candy-flavored e-cigarettes and cigars that have flooded the market in recent years and threaten to addict a new generation,” said the Campaign, once again repeating the same tired and incorrect arguments which have been proven unsound on several occasions.

Not all hope is lost

American vapers now look onto Rep. Duncan Hunter’s bill for hope. The bill which was introduced last week, would exempt vaping devices from the FDA’s regulations as it proposes regulating the products as NRTs for harm reduction purposes, rather than as deadly cigarettes.

Many public health experts have been advocating for more reasonable rules for months. They argue that making the products unavailable or more expensive will only serve to push smokers who have been using, or intend to use, the proven effective cessation tools to quit, either back to smoking, or else drive them to purchasing the products on the black market, where they are unregulated and unsafe.