Today, FDA Commissioner Dr. Martin Makary posted on X:

“This illegal importation stops today. I personally have observed kids from good families who have become addicted to vaping. They know they’re addicted, they want to stop, and they can’t stop.”

That’s a bold statement. And also—let’s be honest—completely missing the point.

Yes, we all agree youth should not be vaping. But the idea that cracking down on “illegal importation” is going to magically end youth vaping is the kind of magical thinking we’ve come to expect from an agency that still hasn’t figured out that supply exists because of demand. And guess what’s fueling that demand? FDA inaction, overregulation, and a refusal to authorize the kinds of nicotine products that actually work for adult smokers.

U.S. youth vaping has been declining sharply since its peak in 2019, even as the illicit market for disposable vapes surged starting in 2020. Much of the moral panic around flavored vapes ignores a crucial point: many of the young people who vape today would otherwise be smoking combustible cigarettes—a far deadlier habit.

The real public health crisis? The 30+ million American adults who still smoke. Instead of demonizing safer alternatives, regulators should focus on expanding access to harm reduction tools that help adults quit for good.

Let’s not pretend this is about kids when the FDA has essentially ghosted millions of adult smokers by banning or ignoring nearly every product that helped them quit cigarettes.

Want to eliminate the black market? Try authorizing products people actually want.

The illicit vape market exists because legal, flavored, harm-reducing options have been systematically wiped out by the FDA’s “deny first, ask questions later” approach. If your agency has only authorized a few tobacco-flavored vapes (mostly from Big Tobacco), then guess what? Adult vapers are going to buy flavored disposables from somewhere else.

No surprise here: when you prohibit everything, everything becomes illicit.

The hypocrisy is unreal.

Cigarettes? Still on every gas station shelf. Alcohol? Flavored like gummy bears and fruit punch and marketed with cartoonish labels. But strawberry-mango disposable vapes for adults trying to stay off cigarettes? Banned. Because “kids might like them.”

Let’s be real: the FDA’s crackdown isn’t about protecting youth—it’s about protecting a broken regulatory system and shifting blame away from its own failure to create a functioning PMTA process.

You can’t enforce your way out of a problem you created.

Until the FDA authorizes a meaningful number of safer nicotine alternatives for adults—including flavored disposables—the illegal market will continue to thrive. No matter how many press releases, border seizures, or performative social media posts get pushed out.

Here’s an idea: instead of acting shocked that a black market filled the vacuum left by federal incompetence, maybe fix the process. Authorize more products. Make legal access viable. Stop pretending the only way to protect kids is to punish adults.

Otherwise, all this posturing is just that—posturing.