The Trump administration announced it plans to ban the sale of flavored e-cigarettes, as federal health officials continue to investigate the outbreak of a mysterious lung disease they believe is linked to the product.
Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar said the FDA is working on rules that would ban all e-cigarette flavors other than tobacco-flavored products.
"Why is this important? We are seeing an absolute surge in high school and middle school kids using these flavored products. Mint, menthol, fruit flavor, alcohol flavor, bubble gum. We gotta stop it, we're gonna have a whole generation of children addicted to nicotine," Azar said in a video posted to Twitter.
Azar also spoke to reporters alongside President Trump in the Oval Office. He said: "It'll take several weeks for us to put out the final guidance that will announce all the parameters around the enforcement policy, and then there will likely be about a 30-day delay to effective date, as is customary."
According to CNBC, the FDA was actually supposed to start reviewing the e-cigarette market last summer, until former FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb pushed the review back to 2022.
According to the FDA, last year, more than 3.6 million middle and high school students reported they were currently using e-cigarette products.
So far, 6 deaths related to vaping have been reported. As of Friday, the CDC cited more than 450 possible cases of lung illnesses associated with using e-cigarettes.
Additional reporting from Newsy affiliate CNN.
