DeGette Applauds FDA E-Cigarette Crackdown, Pushes for Ban on Flavored E-Cigarettes

Washington, DC – Congresswoman Diana DeGette (D-CO), a senior member of the Energy and Commerce Committee, today praised the Food and Drug Administration for announcing a crackdown on e-cigarette sales to minors and said the FDA's new Youth Tobacco Prevention Plan should also include banning flavored e-cigarettes, which have been shown to hold special appeal for young smokers.

"Tobacco has serious health consequences, especially for young people who are more susceptible to addiction," DeGette said. "While I applaud the FDA's upholding of its responsibility to ensure that manufacturers and retailers are held accountable, the agency must go further. The making and targeted marketing of tobacco products that are particularly popular with the young, such as flavored e-cigarettes, must come to an end."

DeGette is circulating a letter among congressional colleagues urging the FDA to ban flavored e-cigarettes; she expects to deliver the letter in early May.

For years, DeGette pushed the FDA to regulate the production, sale and marketing of all tobacco products. She strongly supported the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act, also known as the Tobacco Control Act, which in 2009 granted authority to the FDA to regulate the production, sale, and marketing of tobacco products. Intended to prevent young people from using such products at an early age, when they are more susceptible to addiction, the law resulted in a final rule bringing tobacco products under FDA authority in 2016.

That same year, the Surgeon General found that "the use of products containing nicotine in any form among youth, including in e-cigarettes, is unsafe."

DeGette is the author of the Tobacco to 21 Act (H.R. 4273), which prohibits the sale or distribution of all tobacco products to people under age 21.