Statement of Michael R. Bloomberg on the FDA Denying Marketing Applications to All Juul Products
New York, NY – Today the FDA took its most significant step to date to protect children’s health and end youth nicotine addiction by denying marketing applications to all Juul products currently marketed in the U.S., including Juul menthol flavored e-cigarettes.
When we launched our Protect Kids program in 2019, e-cigarette use was significantly on the rise. After spending $160 million taking on Juul and other flavored e-cigarettes, we have made some encouraging progress – and this move by the FDA is a powerful validation of our work. More than any other company, Juul has been responsible for today’s youth e-cigarette epidemic. The company’s product is sold in flavors that are appealing to kids, including menthol, with pods that deliver as much nicotine as 20 packs of cigarettes. Coupling this addictive product with a vast marketing campaign, more than 5.3 million U.S kids used e-cigarettes by 2019. Juul clearly put its profits before our children’s health by selling flavored e-cigarettes to get kids to start using the product, and with high nicotine levels to keep them addicted. The FDA is right to act by denying Juul’s applications and refusing to abide by its dangerous practices.
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About Bloomberg Philanthropies:
Mike Bloomberg has been a leader in the tobacco control movement for more than 20 years. In 2019, Mike opened a new phase in his tobacco control efforts with Protect Kids: Fight Flavored E-Cigarettes, a $160 million initiative to end the youth e-cigarette epidemic by banning the sale of flavored tobacco products. Previously, as Mayor of New York City, Mike secured the passage of one of nation’s first smoke-free air laws, a law that contributed to a three-year increase in average life expectancy in New York City a decade after its passage, outpacing national trends. Since 2007, the Bloomberg Initiative to Reduce Tobacco Use, a Bloomberg Philanthropies program, has led tobacco control efforts across the world; today, 65 percent of the global population (5 billion people) lives in a country that has adopted a life-saving, tobacco control policy, up from 15 percent since the initiative started.
Media Contact:
Jean Weinberg
jean@bloomberg.org