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Welcome to Breazy Briefs, where we take a look around the globe, searching for news, science, and the occasional tasty pop culture tidbit related to vaping and the life of vapers. Today, let's talk about…

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…a potential move by the Food and Drug Administration that would shorten the amount of time vapor product manufacturers have to submit pre-market applications in order to remain in business. The current deadline of August 2022, anti-vape activists argue in a lawsuit, gives manufacturers too long to comply. Opponents would like to see all vapor products pulled from shelves within 90 days, but the FDA says it would consider an advanced deadline of no less than 10 months following the conclusion of the legal proceeding.

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Malaysian officials say they're not going to ban vaping, despite lawmakers voicing concerns about questionable ingredients, including illicit drugs, that they say are making their way into e-liquids there. The legislature is supposed to consider a bill granting the government regulatory authority over vapor products, and a federal survey in Malaysia is ongoing to learn who among their population is vaping and why. Here at home we've seen the entire vaping world turned on its head in the wake of a single government survey, so we'll watch this one with interest to see if international findings mirror those in America.

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Do age-restrictions like those Juul has proposed that would use Bluetooth and wi-fi technology to stop teens from vaping pose privacy risks? The linked article posits that not only is there reason for concern whenever a big company finds a new way to mine personal data, the vapor industry is a particularly suspect group. The argument starts with the idea that vapor companies are in the business of getting children addicted to nicotine rather than helping adults quit smoking cigarettes, so it's easy for those more knowledgeable to write off claims that Juul would use vaper data to design an intentionally more-addictive product, but on second thought we're not exactly thrilled with the idea of an e-cig that uses its Bluetooth connection to our phones to ping a report back to some corporate headquarters every time we take a puff.

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New research out of the University of Southern California suggests that non-vapers, particularly young ones, were more likely to vape when exposed to advertising and packaging featuring cartoon characters. If supporting studies going forward reach similar conclusions, it's not at all unreasonable to expect, and even support, an FDA guideline that would make it easier to design packaging that conveys a brand to an adult while being unappealing to teens. An approach like that not only curtails underage vaping but also preserves adult smokers' right to choose a product to help them switch.

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Cigalike giant Juul is facing yet another investigation into allegations it knowingly created marketing materials that would appeal to teens. This one is being initiated by a federal House of Representatives subcommittee, which is demanding all sorts of internal communications dating back to 2013, including documents that could describe the company's marketing strategy behind choosing ad buys and social media influencers to promote its product. For its part, Juul is trying to play the inquiry off as a chance to show off everything it's done over the course of the last year to change its image.

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This piece takes issue with reports that refer to vaping as 'unsafe.' More broadly, the author argues, and we agree, that when there are wide variances of potential danger, equating two wildly different things as the same is in itself a risk. Vaping, while not risk-free, is believe to be broadly less harmful than smoking. Likewise, while public health agencies say that no amount of alcohol consumption is safe because it can cause a host of diseases, there's certainly a big difference between a person who enjoys a single glass of wine in the evening and someone who drinks to excess on a regular basis. This sums up our opposition to regulatory frameworks (and public relations campaigns) that treat vaping as no different from smoking – vaping absolutely needs regulations in place to guide the industry, but considering vaping to be just as bad as smoking does more harm than good in the long run.

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Young adult smokers and vapers in Illinois next week will find themselves in an odd predicament, when the state raises its minimum age for the purchase of nicotine products to 21. Most of these 'Tobacco 21' laws, as they're known (eight states now have them in place) contain no grandfather clauses for adults who were legally purchasing tobacco or vapor products before the laws to continue doing so.

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India is still plowing ahead with a potential complete ban on vapor products. The linked article is the latest in a long string popping up around the country in noting the hypocrisy in banning vaping while taking no action against smoking, even in a country with 100 million smokers, more than anywhere else in the world.

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This reporter is excited that her dad finally quit smoking after 35 years, thanks to a Juul she's gifted him. Now, she says that while he's sought out off-brand pods with lower nicotine levels and is using his vape less and less, she's still conflicted in that six months after quitting smoking he's so happy with vaping that he might never quit. In visiting various health experts, she reaches the same conclusion we've already supported: if you don't smoke, you shouldn't vape. Not vaping is better for you than vaping. But if vaping allows you to avoid smoking, you absolutely should use it as a tool to prevent relaps.

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Science: Portland State University researchers are warning that sucralose, a popular artificial sweetener, may release toxic compounds when vaped. Popular as a sugar substitute and often marketed under the brand name Splenda, sucralose is perfectly fine to eat. But the act of vaporization changes its chemical makeup, as is common with most e-liquid ingredients, this time creating potentially harmful results. We'll be waiting for a follow-up explaining the methodology (are sweeteners safe below a certain temperature, how do the chemicals found in sweetened vapor compare to those in cigarettes), but for now it might be best to limit the amount of super-sweet liquids you're vaping, along with the cinnamon and menthol flavors found to raise alarm bells in recent months. A sucralose substitute that enriches flavors without simply adding sugar taste is ethyl maltol – looking for e-liquid suppliers who are transparent about their recipes and use EM instead of sucralose might also not be a bad idea. Erythritol is another less-common sweetener that works like sucralose but is stable at higher temperatures and also a potentially better substitute. Now that we've established a baseline risk from one sweetener, we'd love further research to compare the three and identify the least-risky option.

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Opening the latest salvo in the war against underaged vaping, schools across the nation say they're going to begin random drug testing on students as young as middle-school-aged to determine whether youth have recently been exposed to nicotine. The linked article poses the issue as one of privacy rights, which is entirely valid. We've got to wonder if there isn't a better way to convey the message that nicotine is bad and should be avoided if at all possible by pretty much everyone.

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We'll cap things here for now. Just remember, as soon as vaping news breaks, we'll be here to fix it!