Should Nicotine Be Classified As A Drug Essay

1. Do you agree with the FDA that nicotine can be classified as a drug and that cigarettes can be classified as devices under the definitions in the Food, Drug and Cosmetics Act?

I agree that nicotine can be classified as a drug because it falls into the categories of the three clauses (A), (B), (C) and (D) under the definitions in the Food, Drug and Cosmetics Act:

- It is article recognized in the official U.S Pharmacopoeia (Clause A)
- It is article that intended for use in the diagnosis, cure, treatment in man (Clause B). Nicotine originally is used as a therapy for certain conditions.
- It is an article intended to affect the structure or any function of the body of man (Clause C). Surely, nicotine can cause cancer, emphysema, heart disease, etc.
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2. Did the FDA make any legal or political errors that defeated its effort to regulate tobacco? Yes, the FDA did make a legal error that defeated its effort to regulate tobacco. If the FDA wishes to regulate a product, it must first determine that the product falls within its jurisdiction; and if the FDA held that nicotine was a drug and cigarettes were a device to deliver that drug to the body, it would have to ban them. Secondly, by attempt to regulate the advertisements of the tobacco industry in strict manners, the FDA's regulations was argued by the tobacco industry to violate the first amendment's guarantee for the Constitutional rights to free commercial