WVS NEWS: Rumours of the death of the US Office on Smoking and Health just might be true
And it appears many in the vaping sector are not particularly sympathetic to the OSH coming to an end. Public health commentator Clive Bates said few in the industry would mourn its passing.
“There will be much hand-wringing about the closure of the OSH, but those complaining should take a hard look at how this office was conducting itself,” he told ECigIntelligence. “Maybe some parts of the federal government have lost public trust because they are not trustworthy.”
He added that he thought the OSH had not served US public health particularly well. It became a source of misinformation and doubt about alternative reduced-risk nicotine products rather than focusing on lowering rates of death and disease from smoking using whatever approached worked. For example, the OSH never deliberately encouraged smokers to switch to reduced-risk products but focused more on the so-called youth vaping epidemic rather than the positive net public health boost from adult smokers switching to vaping.
“It has never provided actionable risk information that would help smokers switch or inform their choices,” he said about the OSH. “It has promoted misunderstandings about Evali [e-cigarette, or vaping, product use associated lung injury], popcorn lung and gateway effects. It relentlessly fudged the critical distinction between combustible and non-combustible tobacco or nicotine, using the unscientific and ambiguous term ‘tobacco’ to refer to radically different products with very different risks.”
‘Triage’ of functions necessary
Looking forward, Bates does not believe the alleged closure of the OSH means the US will bow out of tackling smoking as a public policy issue. Many parts of the OSH’s functions and missions will likely be transferred or reformed in some way.
“We have seen the pieces thrown in the air, but we haven’t yet seen how it all lands or if anything will be left in the wreckage,” he said. “What is needed now is a thorough triage of the OSH’s work, with three buckets: stop, keep or reform. There will be essential work to retain, such as continuity in surveys and datasets. Some of the communications and advocacy should change to a more pragmatic approach to smoking cessation. And some of the advocacy and campaigning is likely doing more harm than good and should stop.”
One example of OSH advocacy is its “Tips from Former Smokers” campaign, which proponents point to as a successful example of public health messaging that one study said helped 1m successfully quit between 2012 and 2018.
The most recent edition of the campaign was highlighted by the HHS spokesperson, potentially suggesting it may be one of the programmes to continue in the more streamlined HHS. The current version of the campaign was launched in February 2025 and will run through September, with ads airing on TV, streaming channels, websites and social media. “Additionally, the CDC will continue to provide resources for individuals who want to quit smoking and conduct ongoing surveillance on smoking habits,” the spokesperson added.
‘No plan other than chaos’
Others are not so sure about the strategy behind the closure and the future direction of smoking policy in the US. David Sweanor, adjunct professor and advisory committee chair at the University of Ottawa Centre for Health Law, Policy and Ethics, said: “There appears to be no plan other than chaos coming from the Trump administration, so I think it is impossible to read any strategic thinking into its actions with the CDC.”
Sweanor partly agreed with Bates that the OSH has not had a great track record when it comes to information on reduced-risk products. He told ECigIntelligence that it had a shameful decades-long history of misrepresenting the relative risks of cigarettes and nicotine alternatives, which has undoubtedly led to an undermining of public trust – particularly given the continued transformation of the US nicotine market from smoking to nicotine alternatives, regardless of the actions of the OSH and other US agencies that have taken a fairly anti-vaping, pro-nicotine-prohibition stance. This has likely further contributed to the further degradation of trust in expertise, with more and more people choosing to “do their own research” rather than take the word of specialists.
Loss of data
But the loss of the OSH is not a simple black-and-white issue. The consequences are multifaceted. For example, Sweanor added that “the OSH has long been a very important source of data for those seeking to understand the tobacco market, even though that data has been presented in ways biased against harm reduction”.
Other public health experts have focused on this aspect when lamenting the loss of the OSH. Tom Frieden, a former director of the CDC, said the OSH played a distinct and essential role by tracking use, analysing tobacco-related disease, and sharing data. He added that it and the US Food and Drug Administration’s Center for Tobacco Products played complementary rather than redundant roles.
“Eliminating CDC’s tobacco-prevention programme would mean less data to inform physicians and parents, weaker state programmes, fewer evidence-based strategies, and more people – especially kids – addicted to tobacco,” Frieden said. “This isn’t making government efficient, it’s making it easier for tobacco to hook the next generation, increasing healthcare costs, and selling out to Big Tobacco.”
– Freddie Dawson ECigIntelligence senior contributing editor
