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 U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani in Boston has set a quick
schedule to consider whether to block Massachusetts Governor Charlie
Baker's administration from enforcing a four-month ban on the sale
of vaping products.
Baker's move came as federal officials on Thursday reported that 18
people have died from a mysterious vaping-linked illness that has
sickened more than 1,000 in the United States.
Trade group Vapor Technology Association (VTA) is challenging
Baker's Sept. 24 ban in a lawsuit that was filed on Tuesday.
VTA, which sued along with the operators of several vape shops in
Massachusetts, Connecticut and New Hampshire, said the order amounts
to an unconstitutional prohibition on retail and online advertising
of their legal products.
The group's lawyers, including Joseph Terry of Williams & Connolly,
argued the order not only violated the plaintiffs' free speech
rights under the U.S. Constitution, but also the Commerce Clause's
prohibition on state laws that unduly restrict interstate commerce.
Baker announced the ban on sales of e-cigarettes and vaping
supplies, both those used for nicotine and THC, the psychoactive
ingredient in marijuana, which is legal in the state, in response to
the nationwide surge in a sometimes deadly lung disease linked to
vaping.
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The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has linked
vaping to 18 deaths and 1,080 confirmed and probable cases
nationally in mostly otherwise healthy people who contracted the
mysterious respiratory illness. It has said most patients affected
reported using products containing THC.
More than two-thirds of patients are male. The median age of cases
is 23 years, with about 62% of patients aged 18-34, according to the
CDC.
The VTA says Baker's ban, if left standing, will irreparably destroy
Massachusetts' $331 million nicotine vapor products industry and the
livelihoods of the nearly 2,500 workers it employs.
The lawsuit is one of a number filed nationwide by vape shops and
the VTA challenging restrictions announced by various states in
response to the outbreak of vaping-related illnesses.
Governors in Michigan, New York and Rhode Island have all restricted
sales of flavored e-cigarette products in recent weeks. Ohio
Governor Mike DeWine on Tuesday called on state lawmakers to pass a
ban on most flavored e-cigarettes.
(Reporting by Nate Raymond in Boston; Writing by Tim McLaughlin in
Boston; Editing by Scott Malone and Bill Berkrot)
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