WPTV Reporter Katie La Grone Denies Science and Courts Solely To Sensationalize E-Cig News Story

PRLog (Press Release) - Aug. 17, 2011 - In her August 11, 2011 news story titled “Electronic cigarette, what's really in it?”, WPTV Reporter Katie La Grone choose sensationalism over journalism by failing to cite the US Courts, the FDA, the EPA, Tobacco Harm Reduction Scientists and over 20 completed scientific studies of the electronic cigarette (e-cig) all of which have never found a single toxin, chemical or any ingredient at any level harmful to humans. In truth, the FDA’s own study La Grone cites found that the electronic cigarette is over 1,400 times less harmful then a regular tobacco cigarette refuting her and her interviewed “experts” statements that the e-cig “has serious concerns and may actually pose more dangers to users”. There are now more than 1 million Americans using the e-cig (which was first brought to the U.S. in 2007) and there has never been a single incidence of harm by its use.  

Miss La Grone failed to make any mention that on December 7, 2010 the D.C.U.S. District Court of Appeals (that ruled over the FDA’s failed electronic cigarette litigation initiated in 2009) stated “Regarding harm to third parties and to the public interest, the district court observed that the FDA had cited no evidence to show that electronic cigarettes harmed anyone. ” La Grone shamefully continued in her piece to actually take a bottle of anti-freeze and pour it into a glass bowl and made the statement “the FDA tested a small sample and found a number of toxic chemicals including one called  diethylene gylcol, the same ingredient used in antifreeze!” This resoundingly refuted statement placed in solely to shamefully shock the public has no merit as the FDA actually ALLOWS diethylene glycol in food as cited by the FDA, HHS 172.818 “ … diethylene gylcol may be safely used in food in the following prescribed conditions.. contains no more than 0.2 percent total by weight of ethylene and diethylene gylcols” There is another ingredient used in antifreeze that is in our daily diet-water. Yes, antifreeze is allowed in foods and its not the element that is toxic but its concentration.

Had La Grone taken any time to research her story and not rely on shameful disinformation for grandeur, she would have learned and disseminated to the public that the e-cigs main ingredient, propylene glycol (that her “expert” American Lung Association’s Dr. Mike Feinstein  cited as “some type of chemical”) is approved by the EPA for human use by stating “Upon reviewing the available toxicity information, the Agency has concluded that there are no endpoints of concern of oral, dermal, or inhalation exposure to propylene glycol and dipropylene glycol.” There are only five basic ingredients in an e-cig and all have been approved by the FDA and EPA and there are now over 20 e-cig scientific studies and in none has there ever been found a single ingredient at any level harmful to humans-a point that ruins her agenda.

Miss La Grone’s shockingly ill-researched news piece is a testament to a reporter who followed an agenda and a news organization, WPTV, that had no oversight in her malicious attack on the one product over 1 million Americans are now using as a logical option to the smoking of tobacco cigarettes-the one product we know kills over 400,000+ Americans a year. The true victim of her piece? Gwynne Chesser. A lovely woman La Grone interviewed for her piece who smoked for 40 years and now “has no problem throwing in the trash (her e-cig)” her one logical option and now will be returning to tobacco cigarettes-shameful.

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The TVECA has been established to provide the media, legislative bodies and those that are currently using the electronic cigarette (e-cig) a single industry resource to simply provide the scientific facts behind a new technology that has garnered tremendous disinformation. Not with over 500,000 Americans using the e-cig and over 21 scientific studies of e-cig constituencies it is our mission to disseminate the facts and truths about a new technology smokers are actually using daily and health advocacy groups are aligned against.