The Smoke-Free Alternative Trade Association (SFATA) announced that the House Appropriations Committee passed an amendment, last Tuesday, that could save 99 percent of e-cigarette products from prohibition.
The amendment to the Agriculture Appropriations bill offered by Representative Tom Cole (R-OK) and co-sponsored by Representative Sanford Bishop (D-GA) would modify the grandfather date for vapor products in the FDA’s upcoming deeming rule.
“Without a change in the February 2007 predicate date, the FDA’s proposal will destroy thousands of small businesses and hand over the vapor industry to Big Tobacco.” warned Gregory Conley, President of the American Vaping Association.
“While this amendment is just the very first step in the process to reevaluate e-cigarette and vaping products regulation based on sound science and overall population benefit, we are confident that the FDA will now find renewed impetus to work with the industry and researchers towards development of vaping products standards, to ensure responsible manufacturing and advertising, communicate comparative risk among various tobacco products, and create a level-playing field for compliant companies to innovate and offer consumers alternatives to smoking that will eventually reduce the toll from death and disease caused by cigarettes,” said Patricia Kovacevic, Nicopure’s General Counsel and Chief Compliance Officer, in a press release.
The bill still needs to go to the House and Senate, “a bit of road ahead of us, but we’re on our way”, reassures SFATA that is working behind the scene to ensure a proper regulation of vaping products.
What can now be called the Cole-Bishop amendement is a major step in the rulemaking process. No doubt that it will have positive outcomes for the vaping manufacturing industry.
“Pro-choice” Democrats are nowhere to be seen except to heap hurrah’s on the FDA ruling.
Democrats are nothing but fuqqin’ Marxists.
I still don’t fully understand how this REALLY helps,. Not trying to be pessimistic, but what we NEED is a judge to place a hold (injunction?) on these new regulations until they can be sorted out in the courts. barring that, the regs WILL go into effect in a matter of a weeks. E-liquid “manufacturers” can (and will) be inspected. We aren’t “allowed” to say vapor products are better than cigarettes,. etc,. etc,. I am in total amazement that the “industry” was SOOOOO ill prepared for this. It has been many days since the official announcement and I have only heard of two lawsuits. WHY were the “big” players, the multi-million per year folks, not have their lawyers ready to go?
If this makes it. It gives us more time. The fight is far from over. This is just one battle of many that will come.
I think this was being said by VTA for some time already
They were telling us about the amendment, the fact that it’s made it out of committee is news, as hr2058 is buried in committee without any chance of movement