Instead, the White House held a “listening session” last month in which tobacco and vaping industry officials, along with public health leaders and some elected officials, argued the pros and cons. At the meeting, Mr. Trump said he feared a ban on flavored e-cigarettes would cause an influx of unsafe counterfeit substitutes. “Any serious solution to skyrocketing rates of youth e-cigarette use must include the removal of kid-friendly flavors, not just the tobacco industry’s preferred policy,” Senator Durbin said in a statement. A federal survey released earlier this month found that nearly one in three high school students reported using tobacco recently. That study was published before Juul and other nicotine e-cigarettes caught on with teenagers.

Source: New York Times December 19, 2019 21:00 UTC