Family Smoking Prevention And Tobacco Control Act - Motion To Proceed

Floor Speech

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Mr. MERKLEY. Madam President, I want to start by thanking Senator Dodd for his tireless advocacy on this issue. The need to regulate tobacco products has been evident for many years, and for year after year it has been impossible to accomplish this goal. It is frankly unbelievable that while we heavily regulate the production and sale of aspirin, a product that is not addicting and not destructive, tobacco, which is addictive and is destructive, goes without regulation.

This bill will go a long way in helping to keep these addictive tobacco products out of the hands of our children. This bill gives the FDA the legal authority it needs to reduce youth smoking by preventing tobacco advertising targeting children. It provides the FDA with the authority to prevent the sale of tobacco products to minors as well as the authority to prevent the tobacco industry from misleading the public about the dangers of smoking.

Additionally, this bill takes important steps in the regulation of smokeless tobacco. We are all familiar with the dangers posed by cigarettes--the health effects have long been documented--both on users and bystanders. We are also familiar with the steps being taken in many cities and many States to rid our public areas of secondhand smoke. These actions, thankfully, have been quite successful, but they lead to a major dilemma for tobacco companies: if smoking becomes socially unacceptable, how can the industry replace the hundreds of thousands of tobacco addicts who die every year? The industry's response has been to bet heavily on smokeless tobacco products and to bet on addicting youngsters to those products.

Chewing tobacco has been around for a while, but it has its own limitations. There aren't many places--outside of this very Chamber--in the United States where you can find a spittoon. So the tobacco companies are looking for hip new smokeless tobacco products that don't require spitting and that can appeal to a new generation of children.

This picture was taken just a few blocks from this Capitol. It is of a new product called ``Snus'' that R.J. Reynolds is selling nationwide. It is a flavored, pouched tobacco product advertised as not requiring spitting. And as you can see here, it is advertised next to displays of candy and Peppermint Patties. I should note that this container was not the original designed for the Snus container. The original container was round. As reported by the Portland Oregonian last December, it came in containers similar to chewing tobacco, but teachers in schools noticed these containers in their students' pockets.

So now R.J. Reynolds has redesigned them so that teachers can't recognize that these are smokeless tobacco products in their students' pockets.

Clearly, the marketing is aimed at young people. But it gets even worse. Now R.J. Reynolds has come out with another product that they are test marketing in three cities across the country, one of which is in my home State of Oregon. Portland, OR, is a site for the test market of tobacco candy.

Tobacco candy, as you see here, also comes in what was designed to look like a cell phone in your pocket rather than a traditional can of smokeless tobacco. They have done two other things to make this product appealing, and I have a sample right here. First, they come in candy flavors. This one is euphemistically called ``fresh.'' It is a mint candy. This one is euphemistically called ``mellow.'' It is a caramel-flavored candy. So they have thrown in the candy flavoring and a really cool dispenser. And not only does the dispenser look like a cell phone--so teachers can't tell what it is--but it has a feature taken from the world of the Pez candy dispenser. You pop it open, and out pops a single tobacco tablet. You close it and shake it around, open it up again, and out pops another one. So we have three features here designed specifically to market to children: the cell phone shape, the candy flavoring, and the Pez-style dispenser.

Now, why is it tobacco companies need to market to children? It is because when adult testers try out a tobacco product, they rarely continue using it. Therefore, they rarely become a customer of a tobacco company. A teenager who tries one of these products--whose brain is still being wired and, therefore, is much more susceptible to the influence of nicotine--is much more likely to become addicted and become a lifelong customer or reliable customer. That is why the tobacco companies are marketing tobacco candy to our children.

There is no question that this tobacco candy is dangerous. The Indiana Poison Control has estimated that each tablet delivers 60 to 300 percent of the nicotine in a single cigarette. The product is addictive. The product causes cancer. And unless we pass this bill and give the FDA the authority to regulate, soon you will see this tobacco candy in a convenience store near you, and we will see more displays such as the one shown here in Portland--tobacco candy advertised right next to ice cream.

Once the companies master the technique of turning tobacco into kid-friendly candy, there is no end to the variety of products that can be turned out. Already RJR has announced they are planning to launch two new forms of tobacco candy; sticks, which look like toothpicks you suck on, and strips, which are nearly identical to breath mint strips that dissolve on your tongue.

Everywhere I go and talk about these products, people are outraged. Meanwhile, the tobacco industry and its champions are trying to justify these products as safe alternatives to smoking. That just isn't so. And that rhetoric poses a real danger to consumers who might think smokeless tobacco is harmless. In fact, this very rhetoric shows why we need to have the FDA regulating this product. In fact, the Surgeon General has determined the use of smokeless tobacco can lead to oral cancer, gum disease, heart attacks, heart disease, cancer of the esophagus, cancer of the stomach.

This is not a safe product. This is not safe tobacco. It is a product like cigarettes that causes cancer and kills. Further, it is not a method of helping smokers to quit smoking. The purpose of smokeless tobacco candy is not to help people quit tobacco products, it is designed to addict them to tobacco products. The idea that the tobacco companies would be out marketing a product designed to get people to quit using tobacco products is, quite frankly, obviously ridiculous. Unlike Nicorette or the nicotine patch, which are designed to help people quit smoking, tobaccoless candy does not help you quit and the doses do not get any lower over time.

The U.S. Public Health Service Clinical Practice Guideline notes:

The use of smokeless tobacco products is not a safe alternative to smoking, nor is there evidence suggesting it is effective in helping smokers quit.

It is no secret these products are dangerous. Six years ago to this very day, Surgeon General Richard Carmona talked about what he called the ``public health myth'' that smokeless tobacco is a good alternative to smoking. He emphatically said that was simply not true, and I think it is worth quoting him at some length:

I cannot conclude that the use of any tobacco product is a safer alternative to smoking. This message is especially important to communicate to young people, who may perceive smokeless tobacco as a safe form of tobacco use. Smokeless tobacco is not a safe alternative to cigarettes. Smokeless tobacco does cause cancer.

That statement is from a 2003 House hearing on tobacco harm reduction, and I ask unanimous consent, Madam President, to have printed in the Record the entire prepared testimony delivered that day.

There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in the Record

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Mr. MERKLEY. Madam President, it is a travesty that R.J. Reynolds can launch an addictive carcinogenic candy targeted at children with no review by the Food and Drug Administration. Nicorette--designed to help you quit smoking--went to the FDA for approval, but caramel tobacco candy or mint tobacco candy--designed to hook kids on tobacco--is on the shelves in Portland, OR, right now with zero oversight.

This bill will finally bring some transparency and common sense to the regulation of tobacco. Finally, the FDA will be able to address the single greatest public health menace in our Nation. I am pleased that this bill does include an amendment that Senator Brown and I authored to require the Tobacco Advisory Committee to expedite the review of tobacco candy. I look forward to passing this bill and to keeping tobacco candy from store shelves before the industry succeeds in hooking a whole new generation of our children.

Madam President, I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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