An electronic-cigarette bill that has drawn concern from anti-smoking groups, doctors and an Ohio State University professor is likely to see a Senate committee vote next week.

An electronic-cigarette bill that has drawn concern from anti-smoking groups, doctors and an Ohio State University professor is likely to see a Senate committee vote next week.

The main thrust of House Bill 144 is to prohibit sales of the increasingly popular e-cigarettes to those younger than 18. But the bill has drawn fire because it also defines the nicotine-infused products, which emit vapor rather than smoke, as an �alternative nicotine product� rather than as a tobacco product.

�Creating a new category of nicotine products is totally unnecessary,� Liz Klein, an assistant professor at the Ohio State College of Public Health, told a Senate committee yesterday. �The industry markets their products as tobacco products and uses nicotine derived from tobacco but is asking you to call them something different for purposes of regulation.�

Groups including the American Cancer Society and American Heart Association have argued that the tobacco industry has been crafting similar legislation across the country in an effort to avoid having e-cigarettes regulated and taxed in the future like traditional cigarettes.

The arguments did not persuade Sen. John Eklund, R-Chardon, chairman of the Senate Criminal Justice Committee, who set the bill for a potential vote next week.

Trying to define e-cigarettes as a tobacco product is a �thinly guised ruse� to get it under federal government regulation, he said. �I think they regulate enough about what�s going on with tobacco and nicotine products.�

The bill, sponsored by Rep. Stephanie Kunze, R-Hilliard, is a �simpler, more straightforward way to go,� he said.

The bill has already passed the House.

Sen. Bill Seitz, R-Cincinnati, noted that one e-cigarette company advertises that it gets its nicotine from eggplant and tomatoes. Critics countered that the vast majority of manufacturers get it from tobacco.

The Ohio State Medical Association recently wrote the committee that while it agrees with keeping e-cigarettes away from youths, the bill raises red flags.

�We simply ask that the committee contemplate not only the bill�s laudable intention of keeping tobacco products out of the hands of young people, but also the potential for unintended ramifications of tax exemptions for alternative nicotine products,� the association wrote.

jsiegel@dispatch.com

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