Summary: The FDA is working to ban menthol cigarettes. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration recently announced it has proposed product standards to prohibit menthol cigarettes and prohibit all characterizing flavors (other than tobacco) in cigars.These actions have the potential to significantly reduce disease and death from combusted tobacco product use, the leading cause of preventable death in the U.S., by reducing youth experimentation and addiction and increasing the number of smokers that quit.Peter Pitts is President and co-founder of the Center for Medicine in the Public Interest. He also serves as a Visiting Professor at the University of Paris School of Medicine and was a former member of the United States Senior Executive Service and Associate Commissioner of the US Food & Drug Administration where he served as senior communications and policy adviser to the Commissioner. He sits down with Dr. Roizen to talk about the dangers of flavored cigarettes and why this is such an important step in the fight against cigarette addiction.
