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Letter: Big tobacco goes after ‘replacement smokers’

By: Beth Hughes, Bismarck, INFORUM
Even though the risks of using tobacco are well documented, it remains the No. 1 cause of preventable death and disease in the country. This year alone, nearly 500,000 Americans will die prematurely because of smoking. Unfortunately, tobacco marketing efforts recruit two new young smokers to replace each tobacco user who dies.
It’s well documented that tobacco companies market to youth in an effort to recruit “replacement smokers.” Research from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention tells us that smoking and smokeless tobacco use are initiated and established primarily during adolescence. In fact, nearly 9 out of 10 smokers start smoking by the age of 18. Tobacco companies know this and continually look for new ways to hook our youth.
Tobacco companies pay convenience stores – many located near schools – and other tobacco retailers to prominently display advertisements for their products near the entrances, exits and checkouts. Tobacco companies also target a new generation of potential tobacco users by designing items to appeal to youth, such as fruit-flavored products in colorful packaging that make tobacco look and smell like candy.
In addition to new flavors and packaging, price is another factor that affects tobacco use. In states with low tobacco taxes, like North Dakota, it’s easier to make tobacco products affordable, and that makes it easier for youth to obtain tobacco. Research supported by the CDC and the American Lung Association shows that increasing a tobacco tax is one of the most effective ways to reduce youth tobacco use; by making tobacco less affordable, kids are less likely to buy it.
The Center for Tobacco Prevention and Control Policy uses media campaigns to educate the public about the dangers of tobacco use. The Center also works with local public health units across the state to educate our communities on tobacco prevention so our children live healthier lives as fewer of them become addicted to nicotine.
We are committed to preventing tobacco use among our youth and adult populations. We’ve made great progress, but there is more work to be done. Showing support for tobacco prevention efforts in your community is a great start to help reduce youth tobacco use rates. Here is what you can do:
• Support tobacco-free and smoke-free policies within your community. When youth are not exposed to tobacco, it increases their chance to remain tobacco free.
• Support policies that restrict how tobacco is marketed. Tobacco companies are aggressive marketers that target youth through retail displays, internet marketing and magazines that are popular with teens.
• Support tobacco tax increases. Our youth are less likely to use tobacco if it is less affordable.
These strategies are CDC Best Practice strategies – strategies that are proven to reduce youth tobacco use rates. We ask the community to join us in this fight by showing your support for tobacco prevention.

Hughes, Ph.D., is a registered respiratory therapist, and chairwomen, North Dakota Tobacco Prevention and Control Committee.
http://www.inforum.com/event/article/id/428702/group/Opinion/

Teenage E-Cigarette Use Likely Gateway to Smoking

By Caroline Chen, Bloomberg News
E-cigarettes facing municipal bans and scrutiny by U.S. regulators received a new slap on the wrist from scientists: A report today suggests the devices may be a gateway to old-fashioned, cancer-causing smokes for teens.
Youths who reported ever using an e-cigarette had six times the odds of smoking a traditional cigarette than those who never tried the device, according to a study published today in the journal JAMA Pediatrics. E-cigarette use didn’t stop young smokers from partaking in regular cigarettes as well.
The global market for e-cigarettes may top $5 billion this year, according to Euromonitor International Ltd. estimates. Makers of the devices, including Altria Group Inc. (MO), the largest U.S. tobacco company, market them online and on TV, where traditional tobacco ads are banned, and some have added flavors such as bubble gum to the nicotine vapor that may have extra appeal for youths. That allure is why the U.S. Food and Drug Administration needs to restrict the devices, opponents say.
“The FDA needs to act now,” Vince Willmore, spokesman for the Washington-based Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, said in a telephone interview. “We think it’s overdue.”
Concerns about underage use of e-cigarettes were raised last year when the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta reported that use of the devices by youths doubled in 2012 from a year earlier.
“E-cigarettes are likely to be gateway devices for nicotine addiction among youth, opening up a whole new market for tobacco,” said Lauren Dutra, a post-doctoral fellow at the University of California at San Francisco and the report’s lead author. “We’re most worried about nicotine addiction initiation in youth.”

Enticing Product

E-cigarettes “are enticing for kids,” said Donovan Robinson, dean of students at Chicago’s Lincoln Park High School. He said today’s findings weren’t surprising. “They’ll say, ‘Hey, now let’s try the real thing.’”
Children in middle and high school, the target of the research, don’t think about health consequences, he said.
“Everything is a fad with teenagers,” Robinson said. They use e-cigarettes “because it looks cool. Teenagers see somebody doing something cool, and they want to do it.”
The latest research analyzed data from the 2011 and 2012 National Youth Tobacco Survey, conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Almost 40,000 middle and high school students from about 200 schools across the U.S. participated in the survey. Students were asked about their frequency of use of e-cigarettes, conventional cigarettes, cigars, pipes, and other tobacco products.

No Tar

While battery-powered e-cigarettes enable the ingestion of heated nicotine, users avoid the tars, arsenic and other chemicals common in tobacco products that have been linked to cancer, supporters have said.
The study today shows correlation, not causation, said Cynthia Cabrera, executive director of Smoke-Free Alternatives Trade Association, the Washington-based e-cigarette association.
“I’ve yet to see any science that shows there’s a gateway effect,” Cabrera said in a telephone interview. “We want to work with facts and science, we don’t want to make knee-jerk decisions based on emotional responses.”
Cabrera warned against drawing inferences on teen use based on the use of flavors in e-cigarettes.
“We do know that thousands of people were able to switch over to vapor products because of the flavors,” she said in a telephone interview. “Would we deny people who were in a group who could die from tobacco to use flavors that helped them get off killer tobacco?”

Nicotine Effects

Opponents have countered that nicotine alone is so toxic it’s been used in the past as a pesticide. They say the health effects of nicotine, which has proven to be habit forming, are unclear and deserve more study. Until that’s done, they’ve said, advertising of the devices should be closely monitored to make sure it isn’t aimed at underage smokers.
“We’re concerned that the marketing for e-cigarettes risks re-glamorizing smoking” among youths who won’t make the distinction between electronic and conventional cigarettes, Willmore said.
In December, a billboard in Miami used Santa Claus to market e-cigarettes and in the recent Sports Illustrated bathing suit issue there was an ad for one of the devices “right in the middle of a bikini bottom,” he said.
“You couldn’t design an ad more appealing to a teenage boy,” Willmore said.

Pivotal Year

This is expected to a pivotal year for producers of electronic cigarettes, with all major tobacco companies either launching new products or expanding their e-cigarette sales exposure, said Kenneth Shea, a Bloomberg analyst. Altria, Reynolds American Inc. and Lorillard Inc. are all expected to pursue U.S. exposure for their e-cigarettes, while closely held Logic Technology Development LLC and Sottera Inc., the maker of the e-cigarette NJoy, try to keep pace, Shea wrote in a report this month.
While tobacco companies have been under the FDA’s watchful eye since Congress gave the agency authority over the $90 billion industry in 2009, e-cigarettes haven’t been subject to the same oversight. The agency is now in the process of readying new rules for the industry designed to establish clear manufacturing standards and set boundaries for how the products can be marketed.
Federal regulators aren’t the only government officials moving to control use of e-cigarettes. On March 4, the Los Angeles City Council voted to join New York and Chicago in banning the use of the electronic products in in workplaces, restaurants and many public areas.

Bans Criticized

The municipal restrictions were criticized by Miguel Martin, president of Logic Technology, the second-largest independent e-cigarette maker in the U.S. Localities should wait for the FDA to make its views known before taking action, Martin said in an interview before the council vote.
“I find it odd that everybody looks to the FDA for guidance on everything else, but because it’s politically expedient, they don’t on this,” Martin said.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-03-06/teenage-e-cigarette-use-likely-gateway-to-smoking.html

Teens Who Try E-Cigarettes Are More Likely To Try Tobacco, Too

By Patty Neighmond, NPR
While electronic cigarettes may be marketed as alternatives that will keep teenagers away from tobacco, a study suggests that may not be the case.
Trying e-cigarettes increased the odds that a teenager would also try tobacco cigarettes and become regular smokers, the study found. Those who said they had ever used an e-cigarette were six times more likely to try tobacco than ones who had never tried the e-cig.
Researchers from the Center for Tobacco Research and Education at the University of California, San Francisco, analyzed data from the 2011 and 2012 National Youth Tobacco Survey, a federal questionnaire administered to students in grades 6 through 12 in middle and high schools nationwide. It asked teenagers whether they smoked electronic or tobacco cigarettes or both.

The survey found that students’ use of electronic cigarettes doubled from 3.3 percent to 6.8 percent in 2011 and 2012. But the number of smokers declined only slightly, from 5 percent to 2011 to 4 percent in 2012.
Teenagers who smoked were more likely to use e-cigarettes, and vice versa. In 2012, 57 percent of those who had tried cigarettes had also tried e-cigarettes. And 26 percent of current smokers used e-cigs as well. By contrast, 4 percent of teens who had never smoked had tried e-cigs, and 1 percent said they use them currently.
E-cigarettes don’t burn tobacco. Instead, a battery heats up liquid nicotine and turns it into a vapor that’s inhaled into the lungs.
Director Dr. Tom Frieden, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, has called the rise of e-cigarette use among teenagers “alarming,” because nicotine is still an addictive drug. Frieden also has expressed concern that electronic cigarettes may be a gateway to tobacco cigarettes.

“The adolescent human brain may be particularly vulnerable to the effects of nicotine because it is still developing,” the authors write. Their study was published Thursday in the journal JAMA Pediatrics.
The study is one of the first to try to get a grip on how e-cigarettes affect tobacco use. It couldn’t look at whether e-cig use caused tobacco use, or vice versa, or why teenagers decided to use the products. And it doesn’t answer the question of whether teenagers used e-cigarettes in order to avoid tobacco.
Although cigarette makers deny they target teenage customers, researchers say the companies aggressively market glamorous and sexy images that appeal to a teenager’s sense of rebellion and tendency toward risky behavior. Those same tactics are now being used for e-cigarette ads, tobacco control advocates say.
The electronic versions also come in a variety of flavors like strawberry, watermelon and licorice. There are far more restrictions on tobacco cigarettes including a ban on offering sweet or fruity flavors, as well as restrictions on advertising and sales to minors. The Food and Drug Administraiton is currently considering whether and how much to regulate electronic cigarettes.
http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2014/03/06/286416362/teens-who-try-e-cigarettes-are-more-likely-to-try-tobacco-too

Doctor Wants Lawmakers to Classify E-Cigarettes as Tobacco

By: WILX NEWS 10
Michigan’s top doctor is calling on state lawmakers to classify e-cigarettes as tobacco products. Legislation currently in the Senate would make it a crime to sell the devices to minors. But Dr. Matthew Davis, Chief Medical Executive with the Michigan Department of Community Health says the bi-partisan package of bills doesn’t go far enough.
E-cigarettes are electronic devices that heat up liquid and allow the user to inhale a vapor. Davis says, “What we’re seeing is that kids are trying these in higher and higher numbers and many parents are concerned. We know this from national research, that their kids may get addicted to nicotine and end up using traditional cigarettes down the road.” Republican Senator Rick Jones of Grand Ledge agrees. “We have a problem in this state. Any 10 year-old can go in and buy electronic cigarettes. Some are flavored like root beer, orange, even cheesecake. and children are getting addicted to nicotine.”
Jones has sponsored Senate Bills 667 & 668. The legislation would make it immediately illegal for retailers to sell e-cigarettes to minors. But Davis says, that isn’t good enough. He wants lawmakers to protect everyone from the dangers of e-cigarettes by taxing them, and banning them from restaurants, bars and other public places. Davis says, “After all, liquid in e-cigarettes is extracted from tobacco and so therefore, they are essentially tobacco products . And certainly tobacco-derived products, it would make sense to use the existing regulations that we have about tobacco products and classify e-cigarettes under that existing regulation.” Jones says, he’s more concerned about limiting access to children. “I understand that they want the moon, and they want to be able to tax these devices just like cigarettes but that will have to wait for an FDA decision. Anything the federal government does will override Michigan law so there is no problem.”
While retailers can sell e-cigarettes to anyone, many say they treat them just like cigarettes and don’t sell to minors. Many restaurants also ban the devices. The legislation is now in a Senate committee.
http://www.wilx.com/home/headlines/Doctor-Wants-Lawmakers-to-Classify-E-Cigarettes-as-Tobacco-248439351.html?ref=351

CTFK: President's Plan to Expand Early Education with a Tobacco Tax Will Protect Kids and Save Lives

Statement of Susan M. Liss, Executive Director, Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids
WASHINGTON, DC – President Obama today again called for bold action to protect our children from tobacco addiction and save lives, urging Congress to increase the federal cigarette tax by 94 cents per pack and similarly increase taxes on other tobacco products. The evidence is clear that increasing the tobacco tax is one of the most effective ways to reduce smoking and other tobacco use, especially among kids, as this year’s Surgeon General’s Report on Smoking and Health just reaffirmed.
This proposal, part of the President’s FY 2015 budget, would do more to reduce tobacco use among kids than any other single action the federal government can take. The tobacco tax increase would also raise $78 billion over 10 years to fund early childhood education initiatives proposed by the President, according to the Office of Management and Budget. Congress should embrace this proposal enthusiastically – it would provide millions of kids with a strong start in life, while helping them live longer, healthier lives free of tobacco addiction.
The need for Congress to increase the tobacco tax is more urgent than ever.  While our nation has cut smoking rates by more than half since the first Surgeon General’s report was issued 50 years ago in 1964, the latest Surgeon General’s report found that smoking is even more hazardous and takes an even greater toll on our nation’s health than previously thought.  The report found that smoking annually kills 480,000 Americans – causing one in every five deaths – and costs the nation more than $289 billion in health care bills and other economic losses.  Tobacco use remains the number one cause of preventable death in our country.
The report also underscored that tobacco use is a pediatric epidemic – 90 percent of adult smokers began at or before age 18, and 5.6 million kids alive today will die prematurely from smoking-caused disease unless current trends are reversed.  The President’s proposal represents exactly the kind of action needed to accelerate progress against tobacco and ultimately end the tobacco epidemic for good.
Among its key action steps, the new Surgeon General’s report calls for “raising the average excise cigarette taxes to prevent youth from starting smoking and encouraging smokers to quit.”
“Raising prices on cigarettes is one of the most effective tobacco control interventions,” the report concludes. “The evidence is sufficient to conclude that increases in the prices of tobacco products, including those resulting from excise tax increases, prevent initiation of tobacco use, promote cessation, and reduce the prevalence and intensity of tobacco use among youth and adults.”
Even tobacco companies admit in their own documents that tobacco tax increases reduce youth smoking.  Economic research has found that every 10 percent increase in the price of cigarettes reduces youth smoking by about seven percent and overall cigarette consumption by three to five percent.
The health and economic benefits of a federal tobacco tax increase were confirmed in a 2012 report by the highly respected Congressional Budget Office. The CBO found that a 50-cent increase in the federal tobacco tax would raise substantial new revenue while prompting nearly 1.4 million adult smokers to quit by 2021, saving tens of thousands of lives and reducing health care costs, including for the Medicaid program. Based on the CBO’s statement that a $1 tax increase would roughly double those benefits, we estimate that a 94-cent cigarette tax increase would prompt 2.6 million adult smokers to quit and save 18,000 lives over 10 years.
We estimate that a 94-cent increase in the federal cigarette tax would also:
·       Prevent 1.3 million kids from becoming addicted adult smokers;
·       Prevent 493,400 premature deaths from these reductions in youth smoking alone, and
·       Save $55 billion in future health care costs from reductions in youth and adult smoking.
The increased taxes on other tobacco products would have additional health benefits, preventing kids from using harmful and addictive products such as cheap, sweet cigars and smokeless tobacco.
Furthermore, national and state polls consistently show strong public support for substantial increases in tobacco taxes, with most polls showing voters favoring tobacco tax increases by more than a two-to-one margin. Polls consistently have found that large majorities of Democrats, Republicans and Independents and voters from a broad range of demographic and ethnic groups all support tobacco tax increases – as do significant numbers of smokers.
In short, a significant tobacco tax increase is a win-win-win for the country – a health win that will reduce tobacco use and save lives, a financial win that will raise revenue to fund an important initiative and reduce tobacco-related health care costs, and a political win that is popular with voters.

ACS CAN: President Renews Call for Stronger Tobacco Control in FY 15 Budget Proposal

WASHINGTON, D.C. – March 4, 2014 – President Obama today unveiled an FY15 budget proposal that prioritizes tobacco control with an increase in the federal tobacco tax, emphasizes the importance of primary care with an investment in workforce training for new doctors and signals his ongoing support for increased investment in medical research.
A statement from Chris Hansen, president of the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network (ACS CAN), follows:
“The president’s budget proposal shows that he remains committed to increasing the federal cigarette tax by an unprecedented 94 cents, which would save lives and reduce long-term health care costs. Increasing tobacco taxes is one of the most effective ways to keep kids from smoking and encourage people to quit. ACS CAN estimates that nearly doubling the federal cigarette tax would prevent about 493,000 children from premature death, reduce the number of adult smokers by 2.6 million over 10 years and lower health care costs by $55 billion.
“ACS CAN applauds the President’s proposal to invest more than $14.6 billion to expand and train the nation’s healthcare workforce – and investment that is vital to our ability to emphasize prevention and wellness in the health care system.  This proposal builds upon the efforts included in the health care law and will further help cancer patients and their families, especially those in rural and underserved areas, to get the health care they need.
“We are disappointed that the president’s proposal reduces funding for critical breast, cervical and colorectal cancer screenings, offered through the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to low-income and uninsured. While the Affordable Care Act makes strides in improving access to these proven prevention measures than can help to detect cancer at its earliest most treatable stages, millions of people will still need access to these critical programs in coming years.
“We are pleased that the budget proposal increases funding for medical research at the National Institutes of Health, but disappointed that the National Cancer Institute would receive only a nominal increase under the President’s budget.  We hope that cancer research will be prioritized as details emerge about the proposed $970 million in supplemental funding for the NIH. Investment in cancer-specific research and proven cancer screening programs for low-income and uninsured are essential to eliminating death and suffering from a disease that will kill an estimated 585,000 people in America and cost the economy $216 billion this year.”
ACS CAN, the nonprofit, nonpartisan advocacy affiliate of the American Cancer Society, supports evidence-based policy and legislative solutions designed to eliminate cancer as a major health problem. ACS CAN works to encourage elected officials and candidates to make cancer a top national priority. ACS CAN gives ordinary people extraordinary power to fight cancer with the training and tools they need to make their voices heard. For more information, visit www.acscan.org.

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Colorado, Utah Want To Raise Tobacco Age To 21

DENVER (AP) – Two Western states with some of the nation’s lowest smoking rates are considering cracking down even more by raising the tobacco age to 21.
Utah and Colorado lawmakers both voted favorably on proposals Thursday to treat tobacco like alcohol and take it away from 18- to 20-year-olds, a move inspired by new research on how many smokers start the habit as teenagers.
“By raising the age limit, it puts them in a situation where they’re not going to pick it up until a much later age,” said Marla Brannum of Lehi, Utah, who testified in favor of the idea there.
In Colorado, the testimony was similar – that pushing the tobacco age could make it harder for teens to access tobacco, and possibly reduce usage rates among adults.
“What I’m hoping to do is make it harder for kids to obtain cigarettes,” said Rep. Cheri Gerou, a Republican who sponsored the measure.
To read more, visit http://sacramento.cbslocal.com/2014/02/22/colorado-utah-want-to-raise-tobacco-age-to-21/

FDA issues first orders to stop sale, distribution of tobacco products

FDA NEWS RELEASE

For Immediate Release: Feb. 21, 2014 

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration issued orders today to stop the further sale and distribution of four tobacco products currently on the market. The action marks the first time the FDA has used its authority under the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act to order a manufacturer of currently available tobacco products to stop selling and distributing them.
The products – Sutra Bidis Red, Sutra Bidis Menthol, Sutra Bidis Red Cone, and Sutra Bidis Menthol Cone – were found to be not substantially equivalent to tobacco products commercially marketed as of February 15, 2007, also known as predicate products. This means they can no longer be sold or distributed in interstate commerce or imported into the United States.
Bidis are thin, hand-rolled cigarettes filled with tobacco and wrapped in leaves from a tendu tree that are tied with string. The manufacturer, Jash International, did not meet the requirements of the Tobacco Control Act to be able to continue selling these products.
“Historically, tobacco companies controlled which products came on and off the market without any oversight,” said Mitch Zeller, J.D., director of the FDA’s Center for Tobacco Products. “But the Tobacco Control Act gave the FDA, a science-based regulatory agency, the authority to review applications and determine which new tobacco products may be sold and distributed under the law in order to protect public health.”
Under the Tobacco Control Act, regulated products were allowed to stay on the market if companies submitted an application to the FDA by March 22, 2011. The law requires the FDA to review product applications so the agency can decide whether the products are substantially equivalent (SE) to valid predicate products. If a company fails to provide the necessary information to show that their product is SE to a predicate product, the FDA has the authority to declare a product not substantially equivalent, which means that it can no longer be sold or distributed in interstate commerce.
In this case, Jash International did not identify eligible predicate tobacco products as required for the FDA to perform an SE review. Also, the company did not provide information necessary to determine whether the new products had the same characteristics as a predicate product, or had different characteristics but did not raise different questions of public health, the basis used by the FDA to review SE applications for tobacco products.
“Companies have an obligation to comply with the law – in this case, by providing evidence to support an SE application,” said Zeller. “Because the company failed to meet the requirement of the Tobacco Control Act, the FDA’s decision means that, regardless of when the products were manufactured, these four products can no longer be legally imported or sold or distributed through interstate commerce in the United States.”
Existing inventory may be subject to enforcement action, including seizure, without further notice. Companies that continue to sell and distribute these products in the United States may be subject to enforcement actions by the FDA.
With regard to retailers, FDA does not intend to take enforcement action for 30 days on previously purchased products that a retailer has in its inventory.  This policy does not apply to inventory purchased by retailers after the date of the order. FDA has issued draft guidance containing more information on the agency’s enforcement policy for certain tobacco products that the FDA finds not substantially equivalent. It will be open for public comment for 60 days, beginning Tuesday, February 25.
The FDA encourages retailers to contact their supplier or the manufacturer to discuss possible options for the misbranded and adulterated product or products that the retailers have in current inventory.
Consumers and other interested parties can report a potential tobacco-related violation of the Food, Drug & Cosmetic Act, including NSE products that continue to be sold or distributed in the United States, by using the FDA’s Potential Tobacco Product Violation Reporting Form.

For more information:

The FDA, an agency within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, protects the public health by assuring the safety, effectiveness, and security of human and veterinary drugs, vaccines and other biological products for human use, and medical devices. The agency also is responsible for the safety and security of our nation’s food supply, cosmetics, dietary supplements, products that give off electronic radiation, and for regulating tobacco products.

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http://www.fda.gov/NewsEvents/Newsroom/PressAnnouncements/ucm386707.htm

TobacNo! Surgeons General and Teens Unite for a Tobacco-Free Generation

By: Chelsea-Lyn Rudder , HuffPost IMPACT Blog
Last week, the Food and Drug Administration released its first youth-oriented anti-tobacco campaign. Unlike previous campaigns, “The Real Cost” does not feature images of smoking-related illnesses, such as cancer and emphysema. In an effort to put a new twist on prevention, “The Real Cost” will attempt to appeal to the millennial generation’s sense of vanity and dignity. Forget the old-school ads, which showed ailing elderly adults and morbid images like body bags in a morgue. “The Real Cost” reminds teens that cigarettes and other tobacco products will rob them of their good looks and bully them into becoming addicted to nicotine. One of the ads features a personified cigarette who pesters a teenage boy, who is trying to spend time with friends, until he gives into his addiction to nicotine and goes outside to smoke.
Everyone hates a bully these days, and I applaud the FDA’s attempt at innovation, but young people know that the real life costs of smoking go beyond trivial and cosmetic implications. The question still remains: How can we move beyond gimmicks and get young people to stop using tobacco products once and for all?
Ritney Castine, 27, has firsthand experience with the real costs of tobacco use. And as a result, has spent most of his life trying to answer that question: “My uncle, who I cared about very deeply died of lung cancer. I wanted to know, what it was that took my uncle away from me. Turns out, it was his lifelong addiction, of smoking a pack of Marlboro cigarettes a day.” Ritney’s uncle passed away when he was only 10 years old, but his death inspired Ritney’s palpable spirit of activism. As a student, Ritney campaigned against the tobacco industry throughout his home state of Louisiana. He was instrumental in the lobbying process, which resulted in a statewide ban against smoking in public places with the exception of bars and casinos. Ritney is now the Associate Director of Youth Advocacy for the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, a not-for-profit based in Washington, D.C.
This week, Ritney will head back to Louisiana to participate in a summit on February 11 in New Orleans, which marks the 50th anniversary of the surgeon general’s landmark tobacco report. “TobacNo! Tobacco-Free Generation” will bring together former surgeons general, current Acting Surgeon General Dr. Boris Lushniak and tobacco-free youth advocates to review the legacy of the 1964 report and to develop strategies to end tobacco use amongst future generations. The summit is hosted by Xavier University of Louisiana and the Louisiana Cancer Research Center. The event is open to the public and will be live-streamed at TobaccoSummit.com.
Last week tobacco-free advocates scored a big win with the announcement of CVS’s plan to remove all tobacco products from its stores. Calling the sale of tobacco products “inconsistent with our key purpose — helping people on their path to better health,” CVS says that tobacco products will no longer be available at their pharmacies after October 1 of this year. Former Surgeon General Dr. Regina Benjamin, lead organizer of “TobacNo,” issued a statement commending CVS’s actions and urging other companies to take the same steps. “We in public health hope others will follow the CVS example because it will make a difference and help our next generation become tobacco-free.”
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/chelsealyn-rudder/tobacno-project_b_4757628.html?utm_hp_ref=impact&ir=Impact

EDITORIAL: Raise Colorado's minimum age for buying cigarettes to 21

By The Denver Post Editorial Board
Teen smoking is not a right, it is a horrible choice that is addictive and incredibly damaging to the young brain.
The federal government has left it up to local and state governments to raise the legal age to buy cigarettes, and Colorado is looking to do just that.
Sen. Steve King, R-Grand Junction, is pushing a bill that will be introduced soon to increase the cigarette-buying age from 18 to 21 — a move he says would add consistency to vice laws that set a 21 age limit to buy recreational marijuana, gamble and buy alcohol.
New York City last year raised the tobacco buying age to 21 and so did Utah— dismissing the argument that 18-year-olds who are old enough to fight in wars and vote should be allowed to buy cigarettes.
That is a bad position when you are talking about the supremely addictive substance of nicotine and what it does to teens.
Research shows adolescent smokers are more likely to become heavy smokers, are much less likely to quit smoking later in life, and are more likely to die from smoking-related illnesses.
Additionally, nicotine has more deleterious effects on developing brain of an 18-year-old than a 21-year-old.
Though the numbers of teen smokers have declined, research shows virtually all new users of tobacco products are under 18.
History also shows raising age limits works. It did with alcohol.
In the 1970s, states lowered the legal age to buy alcohol to 18, a major mistake that resulted in more drunken-driving deaths.
In the 1980s, Congress passed the Uniform Minimum Drinking Age Act, giving states a financial incentive to raise the drinking age to 21. States began reporting fewer drunken-driving deaths, and youth usage and binge drinking fell by a third.
In 2005, the town of Needham, Mass., raised the age to buy cigarettes to 21. The result has been a dramatic local decline in smoking.
Society has said teens can’t smoke recreational pot; we should be consistent with tobacco.
http://www.denverpost.com/editorials/ci_25054723/raise-colorados-minimum-age-buying-cigarettes-21#ixzz2sOZXWxRI