The Trump administration is considering pulling flavored vapes off shelves across the country.
The Food and Drug Administration is preparing a guidance that would ban flavored e-cigarettes from the market, according to media reports.
President Donald Trump met with Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar and acting FDA Commissioner Ned Sharpless on Wednesday about vaping. Azar told reporters after the meeting that the FDA guidance would remove e-cigarette flavors other than tobacco from the market in an effort to reduce the appeal to teens. He also said it would take several weeks for the FDA to finalize its guidance.
“We have a problem in our country. It’s a new problem. It’s a problem nobody really thought about too much a few years ago and it’s called vaping, especially vaping as it pertains to innocent children,” Trump said on Wednesday. “We’re going to have to do something about it.”
He also referenced the recent rise in vaping-related lung illnesses and deaths linked to the activity. “People think it’s an easy solution to cigarettes, but it’s turned out that it has its own difficulties,” he added.
Azar tweeted after the meeting that new data shows teen use “continues to rise rapidly.”
The FDA recently expanded its youth anti-tobacco campaign to include warnings about vaping, with a rollout of TV ads in July urging teens not to vape.
There are also several investigations into a recent series of vaping-related illnesses. A New York State investigation found last week that the lung illness could be tied to high level of a vitamin E oil found in some THC vapes. The illness has sickened as many as 450 people and killed six.
