Is Cutting Tobacco Excise Really a Gift to Big Tobacco? ~ FDA Authorizes 11 New Nicotine Pouches ~ Major Win | Court Ruling Could Dismantle FDA’s Flavored Vape Ban | RegWatch ~ A Flavor Is Not an Age Group ~ Summer 2026 Road Trip Day 8 ~ Britain’s war on safer nicotine products ~ Part 2: What Makes Voluntary Compliance Work? ~ New campaign urges vape consumers to oppose proposed nicotine product restrictions ~ CAPHRA Urges Viet Nam to Choose Regulation Over Prohibition of Nicotine Pouches ~ CAUTIOUS SHIFT | NHRC Pushes the Conversation on Safer Nicotine
One of the easiest arguments to make against reducing Australia’s tobacco excise is that it would be a gift to Big Tobacco. It sounds compelling: tobacco companies sell cigarettes, lower taxes could mean cheaper legal cigarettes, and cheaper cigarettes could mean more legal sales. Therefore, tobacco companies benefit.
There is some truth in that, but it is also far too simple for the Australia of 2026. The real question is not whether tobacco companies might gain something from excise reform. They might. The real question is whether the current policy is still reducing harm or whether it is transferring an enormous market from regulated businesses to organised crime while government revenue collapses. That is a much less comfortable debate, but it is also the one Australia now needs to have.
Today, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), authorized the marketing of 11 new nicotine pouch products through the premarket tobacco product application (PMTA) pathway. The authorized products, made by Swedish Match USA, Inc., are sold under the “ZYN ULTRA” brand name and include the following:
ZYN ULTRA Chill 9 mg
ZYN ULTRA Citrus 9 mg
ZYN ULTRA Cool Mint 9 mg
ZYN ULTRA Deep Freeze 9 mg
ZYN ULTRA Menthol 9 mg
ZYN ULTRA Peppermint 9 mg
ZYN ULTRA Smooth 9 mg
ZYN ULTRA Smooth 11 mg
ZYN ULTRA Spearmint 9 mg
ZYN ULTRA Wintergreen Chill 9 mg
ZYN ULTRA Wintergreen 9 mg
As part of its thorough scientific review of new tobacco products, the FDA considers the risks and benefits to the U.S. population as a whole — including the benefits to adults who currently use tobacco products and switch to a potentially lower-risk product, as well as the risks posed to youth and non-users of tobacco products. To receive marketing authorizations, the FDA must have sufficient evidence that the new products offer greater benefits to population health than risks.
After years of bruising court battles, the U.S. vaping industry has finally scored a major win against the U.S. Food & Drug Administration.
The Fifth Circuit ruled this week that FDA violated the Administrative Procedure Act when it imposed its comparative-efficacy standard without notice-and-comment rulemaking. FDA used that standard to issue more than one million marketing denial orders, producing what the court calls a “de facto ban” on nicotine-vape flavors other than tobacco.
In this breaking-news episode of RegWatch, Keller and Heckman attorney Eric P. Gotting, who represented NicQuid and argued the case, explains why the court vacated the MDOs and sent the applications back to FDA
Apparently, Pop-Tarts are not just for breakfast anymore. BuzzBallz recently released two limited-edition vodka-based cocktails inspired by Frosted S’mores and Frosted Brown Sugar Cinnamon Pop-Tarts. They contain 15% alcohol by volume and are being promoted as a nostalgic treat for adults who grew up with the toaster pastries.
The collaboration immediately raised a familiar question: Is this marketing to children? An alcohol industry member filed a complaint with the Distilled Spirits Council of the United States (DISCUS), arguing that the Pop-Tarts branding had a special appeal to people under 21. Sazerac, which owns BuzzBallz, countered that Pop-Tarts is a mainstream brand enjoyed across generations and that the collaboration was designed for legal-age adults through nostalgia, familiar flavors and novelty.
One of the things that has always been really important to us, is finding moments of gratitude. That means showing gratitude to our friends, our supporters and, yes, sometimes even our adversaries. Because if we don’t recognize the people who lift us up along the way, it makes those moments when people come after us feel that much harder.
Over the last 10 years of advocating for safer nicotine products, we have crossed paths with some incredible people. We have also crossed paths with people who probably wish we would just go away. Spoiler alert: we’re still here.
I’ve been reading the Impact Assessments for the government’s latest anti-vaping proposals and am once again shocked by how little evidence exists for their efficacy and how little thought has gone into the unintended consequences. The cost alone should have been enough for the government to reject these policies, especially when it claims to be on the side of small businesses.
In Part 1, I shared my thought on why we cannot enforce a marketplace into compliance. I still believe that. However, I want to make clear that targeted enforcement is essential, especially when companies deliberately ignore the law.
Today in Part 2, I want to focus on a practical question: What actually makes voluntary compliance work?
I first encountered voluntary compliance from a regulatory perspective 17 years ago, when I joined FDA as a Consumer Safety Officer. The concept is not new to FDA; it is core part of how regulatory compliance functions. FDA cannot inspect, monitor, or enforce everywhere at once. The system depends on companies understanding the rules, taking them seriously, and choosing to operate within them.
The New Nicotine Alliance UK (NNA) has launched a new campaign website urging consumers to respond to government proposals on the packaging, appearance and retail display of vaping and other nicotine products.
The consumer organisation, which represents users of lower-risk alternatives to cigarettes, said the website has been created to help consumers understand the proposals and make their views heard in the government’s consultation, which closes on 2 October.
The Department of Health and Social Care consultation covers proposed restrictions on the packaging, appearance and retail display of vaping and nicotine products across the UK. It includes proposals to standardise packaging, restrict flavour descriptors, regulate the appearance of vape devices and restrict the display of vaping and nicotine products in shops.
The Coalition of Asia Pacific Tobacco Harm Reduction Advocates (CAPHRA)
The Coalition of Asia Pacific Tobacco Harm Reduction Advocates (CAPHRA) is formally calling on the Government of Viet Nam to reconsider its proposed prohibition of nicotine pouches, urging a strictly regulated adult-only framework instead. In its submission on 10 August 2026 to the Ministry of Health, CAPHRA argues that prohibition would remove Viet Nam’s visibility over product quality and supply while doing little to reduce underlying demand.
CAPHRA points to international precedent already in place. The United States operates a premarket authorization system for nicotine pouches, and on 30 June 2026 the FDA granted modified-risk orders for 20 ZYN products, permitting communication that using those products instead of cigarettes lowers the risk of lung cancer, heart disease, stroke, emphysema and chronic bronchitis.
It’s no secret Big Tobacco’s legacy has complicated the case for tobacco harm reduction within public health. But long-standing distrust of the industry is also a barrier for many within the traditional drug harm reduction community, limiting support for safer nicotine products. Shot on location at GFN 2026 in Warsaw, Poland, Gaby Zabala Alemán explains how the National Harm Reduction Coalition is moving the conversation forward through bilingual resources and ten online modules designed for peers, social workers, nurses and people who smoke.
This represents a new narrative opening up. The story now is that Nicotine Replacement Therapies (NRT – gums, patches, etc.) are not very effective and this somehow the fault of the tobacco industry, rather than the pharmaceutical industry.
Stanton Glantz – for it is he – jumped the shark a long time ago so I am reluctant to say that this is a turning point for him. Nevertheless, this is quite a pivot. Not only does he say that NRT doesn’t work, he says that it keeps people smoking.
At the end of July, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in the United States did something remarkable — even revolutionary. They decided to behave in a rational way about nicotine – embracing a sensible “harm reduction” approach. Canada would do well to follow.
Instead, Canada has been focused on “risk aversion” where nicotine is concerned – and such a stance, ironically, protects the cigarette trade.
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