SAUGUS — The Board of Health received an update from Joyce Redford, director of the North Shore Boards of Health Tobacco Control Program, on a statement made by the Food and Drug Administration regarding vapes and pouches across the country. 

Currently, in Massachusetts, it is illegal for flavored vape products and pouches to be sold.

“We prohibit flavors. But the retailers have manufacturers’ letters from these manufacturers, whose goal is to sell their products, and we call it concept flavors,” Redford said.

She explained that while the products aren’t labeled as grape-flavored, they’re labeled “purple,” and manufacturers are claiming they don’t have flavor.

“The FDA sent a letter to one of our colleagues in Fitchburg. She runs a collaborative of 40 municipalities… They’re enforcing, and have been for about a year, that if your vape products or pouches are not FDA authorized, you can’t sell them in her area,” Redford said.

The FDA recently released a list of only a certain number of products that are being authorized by them.

Redford continued to explain that about 40 products are being authorized on the list, and of those, none of the flavored ones are sellable in Massachusetts due to state regulations.

“This is the direction we’re all moving in across the state… We’re comfortable with the fact that we have this language from the FDA,” she said.

Redford continued that retailers will be notified about the list of products allowed by the FDA, and that if any products get added, the retailer can take that in, as long as it is not flavored.

“And our plan is to give the retailer some time to sell down, even though the DPH says that’s kind of giving them permission to sell poison. But, in fairness, I feel like we should give them some time, because… many of them thought they were doing the right thing,” she said.