Entries from September 2009 ↓

I understand that two large and a number of smaller cigarette and little cigar manufacturers got together in a law office in Washington DC on September 11th to see if they shared enough common ground to jointly create a new tobacco trade association to lobby on FDA.  Does anyone know where this effort stands?

Based on a September 22nd news conference with new Tobacco Center head Dr. Deyton, FDA appears confused as to whether HR 1256 covers flavored little cigars and cigarillos as well as flavored cigarettes, which had to be off the shelves on September 22nd.  It appears that FDA conducted sting operations in Pennsylvania and Alabama and demanded that retailers remove Swisher Sweets and Black and Mild flavored cigars since under FDA’s interpretation of the law consumers could “believe” that these products are like cigarettes and are therefore covered by the law.  The question now is how far can FDA’s interpretation of consumer beliefs go?

Well that didn’t take long as Reynolds American and Lorillard filed legal challenges last week to the FDA’s ability to restrict tobacco advertising – under the First Amendment of the US constitution.

Don’t hope for an early resolution as before this is all over it will almost certainly go all the way to the Supreme Court who should rule it unconstitutional.

But will they?

The Tobacco Industry stands by its right to communicate freely with its customers.

The FDA / public health community says tobacco advertising should be banned or restricted.

What’s you view?

An interesting side show will be the resrictions on future communications of lower risk products. How do you get this message out in a restrictive advertising market?

The cover story for the August 31, 2009, issue of Chemical & Engineering News was entitled, “Chemicals Leach From Packaging: Food and drugs just can’t leave their wrappings behind.”  URL for article is: http://pubs.acs.org/cen/coverstory/87/8735cover.html .  The same agency that regulates packaging materials for foods and drugs, now is regulating tobacco products.  For many years, the major tobacco companies have had strict controls on materials used in their packaging and levels of residual solvents they will permit, companies with fewer resources may not have the skilled personnel and equipment to ensure that they are not having problems with packaging, not only in terms of regulatory compliance, but more importantly in terms of making sure packaging does not compromise the hedonic attributes of their products.  Please contact me if you need addiitonal information.