Tobacco Regulation Will Save Lives, Money

Congress has agreed to give regulators the power to limit nicotine in cigarettes, ban candy tobacco products aimed at kids and curb tobacco advertising.

The Senate passed the bill 79-17 on Thursday, following the House of Representatives, which overwhelmingly passed a similar measure in April. Congress needs to resolve minor differences in the bills, but President Barack Obama has said he will sign the legislation into law.

We strongly support the measures in the federal legislation because the FDA will be able to regulate the contents of tobacco products, make their ingredients public, prohibit flavoring, require larger warning labels and strictly control or prohibit marketing campaigns, especially those geared toward children.

Because tobacco use is the leading cause of preventable death in the United States, reducing the number of new smokers will save millions of lives and billions of dollars. More than 400,000 people die each year from smoking-related illnesses, and approximately 8.6 million Americans have chronic illnesses related to smoking.

According to the bill, reducing tobacco use by minors by half would prevent 10 million of today’s children from becoming daily smokers and would save 3 million of them from premature death. This type of reduction also would save an estimated $75 billion in health care costs.
T The most important part of this legislation is pulling Big Tobacco marketing away from children. The industry spent about $13 billion in 2005 to attract new users, increase consumption and generate favorable attitudes about smoking and tobacco use generally, according to the bill.

The truth is the industry needs new users to make up for the ones who quit, get sick or die. And since studies have proven that more than 80 percent of daily smokers started before age 18, kids long have been the target audience.

Cutting the marketing that focuses on kids will reduce the number of people trapped by nicotine addiction and the subsequent illnesses caused by tobacco use.

That is a gain for all of us, who have to bear the growing health care costs for sick smokers. These illnesses and costs are an unnecessary and preventable drain on society.

The bill notes that cutting the number of young smokers in half would result in $75 billion in health care savings. We are encouraged by the overwhelming legislative support and look forward to Obama signing this bill into law.