The new requirements would apply to all tobacco products including cigars and smokeless tobacco, aswell as vaping products. The aim, says the FDA, is to prevent contamination of the products and set some standards on the way they are manufactured and packed, so that consumers know exactly what the products contain.
If enforced, these new regulations would require tobacco and vape companies to take a closer look at their products in order to identify anything that does not meet the standards, and recall them. Moreover, all the ingredients, components, additives and materials would also be traceable, so that if a product that does not meet standards it is easily identified and traced and can therefore be recalled.
Director of the FDA’s Center for Tobacco Products, Dr. Brian King said that the intention of the regulations is to minimize the risks associated with the products. “While no tobacco product is safe, this proposed rule is intended to minimize or prevent additional risks associated with these products,” he said in a news release. “Once finalized, it would establish requirements for tobacco product manufacturers that will help protect public health.”
Requests by the FDA’s commissioner to support the CTP
In response to a recent review identifying numerous problems, Commissioner Califf has recently urged congress to approve a user fee agreement with the e-cigarette industry, in order to cover the costs of the workload caused by it. “To achieve these goals, we need to have the appropriate resources to hire and retain staff with the skills needed to effectively meet our public health mandate around tobacco,” he said.
Moreover Califf has announced plans for better communication and transparency on product reviews, increased use of the tobacco advisory committee and intra-agency meetings on enforcement.
Read Further: CNN
