The Biden administration's Food and Drug Administration (FDA) took a significant new step on Wednesday that would effectively ban cigarettes currently on the market in favor of those with lower levels of nicotine. "Today, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration issued a proposed rule that, if finalized, would make cigarettes and certain other combusted tobacco products minimally or nonaddictive by limiting the level of nicotine in those products. If finalized, the United States would be the first country globally to take such a bold, life-saving action to prevent and reduce...

The Biden administration released a proposal Wednesday to dramatically reduce nicotine levels in cigarettes, a move that anti-smoking advocates believe would save millions of lives but that threatens the powerful tobacco industry. The Food and Drug Administration’s plan to slash nicotine to minimally or nonaddictive levels represents a last-ditch effort by President Joe Biden to influence tobacco policy. The agency is proposing the policy in the waning days of his term, leaving it up to Donald Trump to finalize the effort — or scrap it — once he takes office....

Federal officials on Wednesday released a far-reaching proposal to make cigarettes less addictive by capping their nicotine content, a goal long sought by antismoking advocates that is unlikely to go into effect anytime soon. The proposed rule from the Food and Drug Administration comes in the final days of President Joe Biden’s term, greatly reducing the likelihood that it will actually be enacted. President-elect Donald Trump and his health nominees have not commented on the measure, but a similar effort led by Trump’s first FDA commissioner, Dr. Scott Gottlieb, was...

Lower nicotine requirements in cigarettes could be coming soon The Food and Drug Administration is set to propose limiting nicotine in cigarettes and other combustible tobacco products, a move the outgoing Biden administration and anti-smoking advocates have said could make smoking a lot less addictive and easier to quit. Nicotine is the substance in cigarettes that makes them highly addictive, and Erika Sward, assistant vice president of national advocacy at the American Lung Association, says capping the amount allowed in cigarettes to very low or non-addictive levels could have a...

Jan 14 (Reuters) - A federal judge in Texas has blocked the U.S. Food and Drug Administration from enforcing a looming requirement that cigarette packages and advertisements contain graphic warnings illustrating the health risks of smoking. U.S. District Judge J. Campbell Barker in Tyler, Texas, on Monday sided with R.J. Reynolds and other tobacco companies in finding the FDA went beyond its authority by requiring packaging and advertising to contain 11 specific warnings. He said those warnings go above and beyond the nine that Congress specified when in 2009 it...

During the mid-1990s, the FDA sought to address nicotine levels in cigarettes by regulating it as a drug, a historic initiative that fell apart when the Supreme Court ruled the agency lacked the authority to regulate tobacco. A 2009 federal law gave the agency that power, allowing the FDA to set product standards that included regulating nicotine yields but not to ban cigarettes or impose a zero-nicotine requirement. For instance, research by Dorothy Hatsukami of the University of Minnesota Medical School and Donny concluded that cigarettes with at least 95...

A Dorchester man was arrested Saturday night after allegedly being found with 700 packs of unstamped menthol cigarettes, 38 bags of crack cocaine and other contraband, Boston Police said Sunday. BPD officers were conducting an ongoing drug investigation and executing search warrants for a building on Roseland Street just before midnight, according to the department. At the site, BPD said, cops allegedly found 38 plastic bags or about 50 grams of crack cocaine, a “large plastic bag” of marijuana, about 700 packages of unstamped menthol cigarettes, drug paraphernalia, and $2,074....

The front page of the Deseret News on Jan. 11, 1964, with four stories on the U.S. surgeon general's report on the effect of smoking cigarettes on one's health. A look back at local, national and world events through Deseret News archives. On Jan. 11, 1964, U.S. Surgeon General Luther Terry issued “Smoking and Health,” a report that concluded that “cigarette smoking contributes substantially to mortality from certain specific diseases and to the overall death rate.” The report, covered extensively in the Deseret News and by other news organizations, did...

In its last few days of power, the Biden administration is expected to officially propose a limit on nicotine in cigarettes. It’d be a last-minute move to push back against the tobacco industry after President Joe Biden failed to finalize a long-standing pledge to ban menthol cigarettes. The proposal, which could come as soon as Monday, is not expected to include tobacco products like e-cigarettes or nicotine replacement patches and lozenges. “This is a Hail Mary from the Biden administration to move forward with a meaningful proposal, or at least...

The Biden administration is a step closer to lowering the amount of nicotine in cigarettes after an 11th-hour proposal cleared a key White House review. Why it matters: The Food and Drug Administration rule, whose precise language hasn't been made public, offers the administration one more chance to address the harms of smoking after it punted on banning menthol in tobacco products. Catch up quick: In 2022, the agency announced plans to limit nicotine levels in tobacco products saying an FDA paper published in the New England Journal of Medicine...