Smoke and mirrors: On the FDA’s nicotine and vaping rulings

Count us fans of the Food and Drug Administration’s historic push to reduce nicotine levels in cigarettes, which, in concert with a proposed ban on menthol-flavored cancer sticks, promises to liberate millions of Americans from deadly addiction. Cigarette smoking is responsible for nearly a half-million deaths in America per year), a fact easily forgotten amid understandable attention to COVID-19’s carnage and the opioid epidemic. It’s the tar and carbon monoxide and other chemicals in burning tobacco that kill, but it’s the nicotine that keeps smokers smoking. A parallel FDA crackdown on some...