Transcripts For CSPAN2 House Oversight And Reform Subcommitt

CSPAN2 House Oversight And Reform Subcommittee Hearing On E-Cigarettes PART 1 July 14, 2024

Good morning, the subcommittee will come to order without objection the chairs authorized to declare a recess of the subcommittee at any time. This hearing is entitled examining jewels role in the nicotine epidemic part one. I recognize myself for five minutes to give an opening statement. After years of steady decline, use, nicotine use has suddenly reversed course, seemingly overnight. Between 2017 and 2018, a youth ecigarette use also known as vaping, rose 78 in one year to the point where over 20 of High School Students now vape. The lingering question is why and what was the role of jewel, the countrys dominant maker of ecigarettes with almost 80 of ecigarette market share in the dramatic rise in vaping . The panel assembled today will help us address these questions and frame our discussion for part two of this hearing here tomorrow at 2 p. M. When jewel founder will testify. Today we will examine what exactly about jewels advising and marketing makes it irresistible to kids . The preeminent marketing scholar in the country will help us answer that question. Afterwards well understand how jewel appealed to youth and simultaneously avoided detection by adults. We will hear about jewels efforts to market directly to kids, including how jewel entered schools under the guise of antivaping presentations then after the School Personnel left the room, unfortunately the jewel presenters told kids that their vaping tools were safe. We will hear from the parents of kids who sat through one such presentation. Two devoted mothers were no angry they founded a nationwide Advocacy Group. I suspect that of all the schools jewel entered, it regrets going into that one the most because it incited the righteous anger that only comes from parents who feel their kids were being exploited. We will also hear that jewels targeting of vulnerable populations was not limited to kids. Ray oleary will discuss jewels attempts to market to native americans. Jewel tried to pay her tribe to give free jewel starters kits to members and told the tribe that its product is healthy and proposed pushing it through the tribes medical professionals. Jewel appeared to think it could get away with this on tribal land and tried to ensure no one else found out about it. The jewel product itself contains very high nicotine levels, three to times the amount of ecigarettes that came before it. Its formula eliminated the harsh taste that previous would have accompanied that much nicotine and masked it with flavors, flavors, which appealed to youth. Kids do not grasp this. 63 of users age 15 to 24 do not know jewel contains nick tenick nicotine and thinks its only flavoring and that its not harmful. And perhaps we can better understand what led to parents sending jewelers like one from june of last year stating, quote, my daughter is highly addicted to the nicotine in jewelling. It is very sad and occurred very quickly over the past several months. She is 16 and now has addictive behaviors that she never had before jewelling, such as stealing money and other teens jewels and she lies and sneaks out at night to get a nicotine fix. Perhaps we can understand why a therapy wrote to jewel disheartened how many of her clients came to her about jewel addiction how, quote, desperately they need to vape. She expressed concerns about kids using jewel to selfmedicate from Health Issues like anxiety and depression. We will also examine what about the jewel device makes it so attractive to teens. It is discrete in a way that no cigarettes or prior ecigarettes were. It puts off a limited cloud of aerosol and its smell doesnt linger, its small. Before jewel was a household name, parents could have looked right past it thinking it was a thumb drive. In fact, ive had one in my hand during this entire statement. Jewel hasnt provided satisfactory answers for these open questions. Its my sincere hope that our hearings today and tomorrow will help us better understand jewels role in the terrible epidemic and point us towards solutions to prevent teen vaping addiction, the chair recognizes the distinguished member from texas, mr. Cloud. Thank you, mr. Chairman and for appearing this morning. For decades weve known that smoking is linked to cancer and 400,000 preventible deaths in america each year. These deaths are preventible if individuals are able to stop smoking. To are years now smoking has been on the decline, but far from eradicating it. Its clear the message that exited for cessation, quitting cold turkey, patches or gum are simply not enough. Recent suggestions that ecigarettes could be viable components to cessation. Theres a growing concensus in the Scientific Community that Electronic Cigarettes are less harmful than tobacco. And a study found that theyre 95 less harmful than tobacco cigarettes and for some who wanted to quick turned to ecigarettes as a cessation aid though the fda has yet to determine that ecigarettes are effective for the purpose other studies found at that ecigarette use is associated with nearly twice the rate of cessation than other nicotine therapies. No one wants kids to be using tobacco, no one wants kids vaping and no one wants Vaping Companies to target children with products. Its illegal for children under 18 to use these products and the tobacco act also applies to ecigarettes. And members of congress and in order to the questions i hope to have questions today. What if any are the cigarettes. Can be part of an over all strategy in a way that ensures that kids are protected and many more questions that i hope to hear answers to today. As doctor said twothirds say they want to quit and to lead to less harmful products. In twothirds of smokers want to quit members of congress can move forward with making transitions, like anything else with regard to its use, whether its used access to marijuana or alcohol the first line of engagement is by parents, schools and local communities to educate them about the risk. Thank you for being here today. Thank you, mr. Cloud. And now id like to turn to our witnesses, first of all, thank you all for joining us today. We very much for coming here thank the audience for coming here on an otherwise fake news day. [laughter] and first from the parents of vaping ecigarettes and miss ray oleary, Turtle Mountain band of the chippewa and a Public Health analyst and researchers with Missouri Breaks Industries research in south dakota. Dr. Jonathan and the departmental chair at Stanford University medical school and a practicing surgeon. And finally, dr. Raymond niora of the department of social and Behavioral Sciences of the college of global Public Health at New York University. Thank you all for coming. If you would all please rise and raise your right hand, i will begin by swearing you in. Do you swear or affirm that the testimony you are about to give is the truth, the whole truth and nothing, but the truth so help you god . Thank you. Let the record show that the witnesses answered in the affirmative. Thank you and please be seated. Without objection, your written statements with be made part of the record. With that miss berkman youre recognized for five minutes let me explain the lighting system here so you have five minutes and its a countdown on the clock, green means youre in good shape. And unlike with stop lights, yellow means speed up and red means stop. So with that, please begin, miss berkman. Not stressful at all. Thank you for your words and thank you for the committee on economics and economic policy. I represent parents again ecigarettes, we call it pave. And it was started by three concerned moms. We have groups of activated parents across the country from california to new york and places in between. We have people with us here today from texas, from georgia, from virginia, new york, new jersey, et cetera. My cofounders, dina alesy and Dorian Fuhrman are behind me between us nine kids ages 7 to 19. Along with our friend mimi, we created this out of the juuling that came out of nowhere and they consider is one of the most serious adolescent crisis faced for decades. Our goal is to give voice to the 3. 6 million teens who are vaping, most of them juuling, this most recent figure from the c. D. C. Is already outdated and as you said between 2017 and 2018 theres a rise in the use of products by High School Students and 48 rise in use by middle School Students and experts believe that the new significance due this fall will likely be much higher to have them go down. We hear from desperate parents every day to contact us seeking resources and information and help for their juul dependent nicotine addicted kids, but theres not yet any fda approved treatment for this nicotine addiction. The stories are heart breaking coming from every state represented on the panel and probably for every state of people in this room, from massachusetts our advocate speaking about her son, a hockey player. He developed a cough and complained he could not breathe while skating. And he was distant and moody, extreme bouts of anger and home environment was toxic and turns out that cade has restrictive lung disease. He needs inhalers and oral steroids and he had been smoking a pod a day, equivalent of more than a pack of cigarettes a day for three years. Kelly from North Carolina is here with her son luca, whose addiction was so severe he spent 39 days as an inpatient at rehab in california. And kelly said we began living with a stranger. Our straight a students grades dropped to f. It was the extreme anger. It turned out our 14yearold had a Substance Abuse problem and that substance was juul. And now i want to share a personal story. The story of how juul went after our kids and their friends by coming into their school. Without the knowledge of the school or of us concerned parents, juul sent a representative to talk to our kids about its product under the guise of education. On april 3rd, 2017, my then 15yearold son caleb who is here told us there had been an antiaddiction talk at school for the ninth grade. The teachers left the room and the man named ali gave a confusing talk about juul telling its not for kids, but for adults. It was much safer than cigarettes. The fda would approve it any day. When he was done, caleb and his friend phillip, dorians son went up to him and ali repeated it was for adults and not kids, and took out the sleek looking juul, showed how it it worked and called the iphone of vapes. And thats when we moms decided to fight back. We discovered a couple months before our kids were juuling under our noses which is common, it doesnt mean youre a bad parents if your kids are juuling, its stealth by design. We knew that nicotine was harmful to our kids brains and as we researched and put pieces together we learned that juuls Deceptive Behavior seemed to be part of the marketing strategy. A retired super was offering people in his state and massachusetts money if theyd implement the antijuul, and came across the stanford medical prevention tool kit with an odd disclaimer we immediately realized was a reference to juul taking information it shouldnt have. None of this is surprising. As i said, juul is stealth by design. Juul says it no longer restocks retail orders of the flavors that research has proven are hooking the kids. Yet, just the other day, in one block radius in two Different Stores i was able to buy these menthol im sorry, these mango pods that juul says are no longer on the market, but theyre still online and thats the problem. If juul really wants to slow the vaping epidemic and keep kids from starting, they will immediately remove all flavors from the market, including menthol and mint, one of the most popular kid flavors, and they will stop spending millions of dollars on lobbyists to impose sensible legislation that pave and Many Coalition parters are fighting for all over the country to restrict access juul and other products. And we hope motivating members of congress on all sides. To hold them accountable for predatory practices and causing harm to so many kids in the country. Its not a political issue, but a moral one, if we dont take action now, we face an entire generation of kids addicted to nicotine who are human guinea pigs for the juul experiment overall. Thank you, miss berkman. Now, miss oleeary, youre on the clock. Good morning, members. Thank you for explaining to juuls marketing to the population. Im a fact witness representing the tribe. A coalition on the reservation, opposing use of Tobacco Products because of the tobacco historical targeting of American Indians which contribute to the deaths on the cheyenne reservation. They handed out Free Products to tribal Decision Makers and offered a switching program to the crc Health Committee and proposed that the Health Professionals from the crc Health Departments reefer smokers, 21 years or older to their switching programs. They would enroll on juuls online portal by entering Personnel Data and health behaviors. They would provide free starters kits to those in the program. And throughout the presentation they made multiple claims that the product is effective or smoking is Smoking Cessation and less harmful. And these are from the family Tobacco Control act. They claimed it was worth over 600,000 to the tribe. Initially, some Tribal Council members were convinced it would improve the quality of life for smokers and fewer Health Care Costs for the tribe. Despite initial interest in the juul switching programs they wisely requested documentation for the switching proposal. Juul did not provide that as requested. Instead sent a mutual nondisclosure agreement to the tribes attorney general with information that they had been discussed by the crc committee. The nondisclosure was not signed, as a result juul has not returned to the tribe. And earlier, passed a resolution that crc shall neither accept this is for other tribal nations as well as the health board. There are many reasons including grave safety concerns safety of exploding batteries and unknown probable health risks including cardiovascular risk. Even though its incontinueded for adult smokers, there are concerns that theyll use juul concealed in a highly flavorable product. This is supported by the American Indian middle School Opportunities in south dakota are using ecigarettes three times more than counterparts. And the other concern is at that juul a growing body that ecigarette users smoke more than. And its true that some have quit. But for every one that quit 81 adolescents will initiate ecigarette use. Nearly juul and other ecigarettes are being used mo more. And the ability to enforce tobacco regulations or publish reports of our 51 adult smoking preference, coupled with propensity to addiction and maybe drawn to crc because of the young population base or the pooshest county in the nation. Juul did not provide acceptable justification for the choice to offer the switching program to titled sovereign nations. I would challenge the committee to look into why juul is interested in partthering with prescribes. As an American Indian woman educated in Public Health and knowledgeable about the tobacco disparate that exists at indigenous populations, targeting American Indians and exploiting Tribal Industries is for too long. In the end, it was the lakota seventh generation beliefs that helped me to reach my decision to testify, what happened is too important not to be shared. Its time to take action to prevent juul and all Tobacco Companies on preying on atrisk populations. As considering policy following this hearing i challenge you to learn from the lakota people of seven generations, leaders must look at how it will affect our descendents seven generations into the future. Thank you. Thank you, miss oleary. Dr. , you have five minutes. Good morning, chairman, and Ranking Member cloud, members of the subcommittee. My name is dr. Jonathan winakof. I have experience treating children and adolescents. Im here prepping the american pediatrics. Juul use among adolescents have reached epidemic proportions and i see evidence of this every day in my practice. Every one of my teenage patients and even many of preteen patients uses these ecigarettes or have friends that use them. They know this theyre dangerous, but believe that juul is harmless. I have to explain that ecigarettes do know the have the same positive benefits at fruit favors that they copy. Rather that the liquid contains toxins and carcinogens and ecigarettes are not good for growing lungs and particularly bad for children with asthma, they can cause conditions, hypersensitivity and pneumoniaitis. Theyre not aware of the nicotine content and one juul pod contains as much as 20 cigarettes and impact the areas of the brain that control function, memory and mood. Nicotine addiction can take hold in only a few days, especially in the developing adolescent brain thats particularly vulnerable to addiction. Ecigarettes concern it because it can lead to combustible tobacco use. Compared to adolescents who do not use the cigarettes, those who use are three times more likely to begin smoking traditional cigarettes. Many of my patients use juul daily and find it impossible to stop. Nicotine withdrawal can cause headaches, insomnia, irritability and they have the only sure fire way to eliminate the use in adolescents is to stop it before it starts. Luckily we already know what needs to be done. We need to ma

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