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** 04 June 2020
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** UK
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** Retailers warn of smokers using “dangerous” loopholes to beat menthol ban (#1)
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** International
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** Study: Non-smokers "have sticky tobacco residues lurking in their home" (#2)
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** USA: Vape company used coronavirus to market to teens, say US representatives (#3)
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** UK
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**

Some smokers are actively looking for new and potentially dangerous loopholes around the ban on menthol and capsule cigarettes, retailers are warning.

Premier retailer Samantha Coldbeck from Hull said some customers had told her they intended to “sprinkle their cigarettes with menthol flavoured e-liquids prior to smoking them.”

“Obviously I have been really shocked and concerned to hear comments like that and am doing my best to warn customers of the dangers of homemade alterations, as vape liquids are not intended to be burned or inhaled in that manner,” she said.

Menthol smokers are also sharing hints and tips on various “ways to get around the ban” on social media platforms. In one Facebook post, a female smoker had posted a picture of her regular tobacco cigarette which she had dipped in a “menthol chill” flavoured e-liquid containing nicotine. A number of other smokers are sharing advice and videos of how to add menthol filter tips to unflavoured factory-made cigarettes.

Source: Convenience Store, 3 June 2020
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** International
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**

Non-smokers may have tobacco residues in their home, research suggests. Concerns over “thirdhand smoke” have been raised in recent years, with chemicals potentially lingering in furniture, carpets and curtains long after someone has lit up.

To learn more, scientists from San Diego State University swabbed doors, counters and shelves in 220 multi-unit apartments. Thirdhand smoke was detected in all the homes, regardless of whether the residents smoked. One in 10 of the non-smoker homes even had more nicotine residues than those whose owners smoked. The scientists warn that chemicals in tobacco are “sticky” and can hang around long after a renter has packed up.

“When someone quits smoking or moves, you don't throw out a couch or the carpet, because you don't think about smoke residue, but after decades of smoking, this residue can be 50 times higher than in a new apartment with active smokers,” said study author Professor Georg Matt. “When you smoke, tobacco smoke chemicals accumulate over time and create these reservoirs that fill slowly and also empty slowly. Some of these reservoirs may never be depleted because chemicals are still sticky.”

The apartment swabs were analysed for nicotine, a marker of thirdhand smoke. Results – published in the journal Preventive Medicine Reports – reveal the two complexes with the highest levels of thirdhand exposure were occupied by non-smokers, where bans on smoking had been in place for up to nine years. Some of these tobacco residue levels were comparable to casinos, according to the scientists.

Source: Yahoo! News, 3 June 2020

See also: Matt G et al. Persistent tobacco smoke residue in multiunit housing: Legacy of permissive indoor smoking policies and challenges in the implementation of smoking bans. ([link removed]) Preventive Medicine Reports. June 2020.
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US representatives have asked the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) this week to ban Puff Bar, the fast-growing e-cigarette that is reportedly increasingly being used by young people, alleging that it has been targeted at teenagers stuck at home during the pandemic.

Although the Trump administration banned fruit, mint, and dessert flavours in refillable cartridge-based e-cigarettes like Juul earlier this year, it carved out an exemption for disposable e-cigarettes. Puff Bar, which launched last year, has been the key beneficiary of the loophole. It has built on its early success by adding a line of flavour pods called Puff Krush that are compatible with the Juul device, upsetting Juul, whose own business has sunk since it restricted sales in the United States to tobacco and menthol varieties last autumn.

Based on data from convenience stores and some other retailers (but not online sales or vape shops), Puff Bar sales have consistently been more than $3m (£2.4m) a week since April 2020, with volumes now more than 300,000 sticks per week.

“Puff Bar is quickly becoming the new Juul,” representative Raja Krishnamoorthi wrote in a letter to the FDA on Monday. Mr Krishnamoorthi, the chair of the House Subcommittee on Economic and Consumer Policy, accused the e-cigarette company of exploiting the coronavirus to sell its products to schoolchildren. To make his case, the Democratic House member included a copy of a Puff Bar advertisement featuring a photograph of a bedroom, with the words: “We know that the inside-vibes have been … quite a challenge. Stay sane with Puff Bar this solo-break. We know you’ll love it. It’s the perfect escape from the back-to-back zoom calls, parental texts and WFH stress.” Mr Krishnamoorthi said that “this advertisement is designed to convince children home from school to vape in their rooms without their parents noticing”.

A second advertisement included in the complaint features an attractive young woman wearing a tight T-shirt and spewing big clouds of vapour. The same picture was used in a separate advertisement that suggested vaping a Puff Bar as a way to relax over spring break.

The FDA declined to discuss Puff Bar. However, in an email, Mitchell Zeller, the director of the agency’s Centre for Tobacco Products, wrote that the agency intended to take action against any electronic nicotine product “if it is targeted to youths, if its marketing is likely to promote use by minors, or if the manufacturer fails to take adequate measures to prevent minors’ access”.

Source: The New York Times (via The Independent), 3 June 2020

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ASH Daily News is a digest of published news on smoking-related topics. ASH is not responsible for the content of external websites. ASH does not necessarily endorse the material contained in this bulletin.

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