A handful of Democratic senators and a House member who issued a recent report on the apparently concerted effort to market e-cigarettes to teenagers expressed dismay with the FDA proposal. The joint statement said: "Today, after years of waiting for the FDA to act, we are extremely disappointed by its failure to take comprehensive action to prevent e-cigarette companies from continuing to deploy marketing tactics aimed at luring children and teenagers into a candy-flavored nicotine addiction," they said. "As long as e-cigarette companies continue to take pages from Big Tobacco’s old and cynical marketing playbook, our children will remain vulnerable to the grave dangers of nicotine addiction," they added.
The American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network’s chief executive, John R. Seffrin, Ph.D., said that while the FDA’s action was an important step, it was still giving manufacturers a chance to skirt oversight, especially when it came to marketing to children. The companies are using tactics that include "marketing small flavored cigars that look like cigarettes, entering the e-cig market with promotions that could dramatically increase use among children and creating several new types of smokeless products," said Dr. Seffrin, in a statement.
He urged the agency to move quickly. "It should not take several more years for the FDA to be able to specify how it intends to regulate the unfettered marketing of many dangerous tobacco products," he said.
FDA Commissioner Hamburg said that the agency would move quickly. "We are eager to see this process move forward," she said.
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