Bill Godshall – Institute of Medicine report to FDA on Smokeless Tobacco an Outrage
Institute of Medicine urges FDA to protect deadly cigarettes from market competition by far less hazardous smokefree tobacco alternatives.
The new Institute of Medicine (IOM) committee report on Modified Risk Tobacco Products is terrible for public health because it urges the FDA to protect deadly cigarettes from market competition by far less hazardous smokefree alternatives.
The IOM committee is basically urging the FDA to impose a several hundred million dollar tax on any tobacco company before it could truthfully inform smokers that a smokeless tobacco product is less hazardous than cigarettes.
While the report correctly points out that NRT products pose virtually no health risks, it ignores a half century a evidence documenting that smokeless tobacco products in Sweden and the US have very similar health risks/benefit profiles as NRT products.
The IOM committee report also ignores the undeniable evidence that several million smokers in the US and Sweden have already switched to smokeless tobacco products, and have significantly reduced their disease risks by doing so.
The IOM committee’s recommendation would require a tobacco company to conduct far more research than FDA requires drug companies to conduct on NRT products before they can be marketed as smoking cessation aids.
Smokers have a human right to truthful health information about far less hazardous alternatives to cigarettes. But this IOM committee obviously disagrees.
In sum, the IOM committee’s report protects cigarettes at the expense of public health, human rights and the truth.
Bill Godshall
Executive Director
Smokefree Pennsylvania
1926 Monongahela Avenue
Pittsburgh, PA 15218
About author
You might also like
Happy New Snus Year!
By the time this post is published, I, Moe Unz will be quite full of food, drink and snus. Especially drink. That is why I wrote this 2 days ago
Bill Godshall: Last Day to Tell FDA to Stop Blocking Smoke-Free Tobacco Alternatives
June 4th, 2012 is the deadline to submit comments on FDA’s Modified Risk Tobacco Product (MRTP) Application Draft Guidance in which the FDA refused (after being repeatedly urged) to acknowledge that smokeless (or noncombustible) tobacco products are far
Bill Godshall – The UK NHS Supports Tobacco Harm Reduction
EDITOR’s NOTE: Bill Godshall checked in with some (amazingly) positive news on Reduced Harm Tobacco as a way to cut cigarette smoking. If only the rest of the EU would