Cigarette Smoking In America

"I'm going to lose a lot of business," deli owner Wadah Arbuya told CBS New York. "I'm going to get hurt big time. Half my sales of cigarettes is between 18 and 21." If this legislation is making a large impression on a deli owner, it will substantially impact those owners of smoke shops, selling predominately all tobacco products.

Cigarette companies use trends, age, culture, and other things to hook a person to their product. The companies mainly target teens because of their ignorance and teens who get addicted that young will likely be customers for life. Tobacco is promoted on almost every television network and 1/3 of adolescent experimentation with smoking results from the advertising. (Tobacco Free Broome and Tioga) Not only are cigarettes promoted on TV, but their promoted throughout everyone’s lifestyle. Maybe a role model you have, maybe one of your parents, or maybe a celebrity you enjoy following... any one of these people could smoke and the mindset of many is, “if they’re doing it, so can I”. Mike Magee smoked his first L&M cigarette when he nine years old, his parents smoked and kept cigarettes in the house and therefore they were accessible. He and his siblings said that learning how to smoke was

Over the last few decades, tobacco and nicotine prevention efforts have risen to an all time high. Prevention efforts focus on education to the public of the negative effects on one’s health when using tobacco and nicotine products, as well as with pleas to healthcare policymakers to increase restrictions on product manufacturing and sales. One policy effort growing in popularity in the United States is called Tobacco 21, which proposes to raise the legal age of purchase for consumers of tobacco and nicotine products to 21 years of age (Farber, Pakhale, & Neptune, 2016). Farber, Pakhale, and Neptune (2016) state that 90% of tobacco and nicotine users begin smoking before the age of 18, with 99% of users starting before the age of 26. Lower smoking cessation rates are associated with earlier ages of initiation and the tobacco industry is known to target youth in advertisement of these products lending to the early age of initiation. The tobacco industry themselves admit that increasing the age allowed for purchase to exclude youth would substantially effect their sales. Tobacco 21 laws also deter adolescents from gaining tobacco or nicotine products from friends 18 to 21 years of age, which is the most likely age group to supply younger teens. With this knowledge, placing tighter restrictions on consumers younger than 21 years of age, using the Tobacco 21 policy, may deter tobacco and nicotine initiation in hopes to prevent individual use at all in the future (Farber

Public health departments and special interest health organizations strongly support policies of increasing the tobacco purchasing age to 21. Organizations like American Cancer Society, American Lung Association and Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids had provided many researches and studies to support the policy. People from age 18 to 21 and parents had mixed opinions. The youth smokers were most likely to oppose this policy. Another large opponents was the tobacco industry, as increasing the tobacco

When we come to the reality and try to realize how many 18 years old are really responsible for what they are doing, it is obvious to tell they are not mature enough to separate the good from the bad because they can easily be affected by peer pressure at this age. The majority of smokers regret smoking because they started doing it when they were not responsible enough for what they were doing. If people accept any 18 years old smoker as responsible and is able to decide if the cigarette is good or not, why do we find them regretting after 5 years or more? If we increase the minimum age of smoking cigarette to 21, people at least might know what they are doing because they are mature enough to decide what to do for the rest of their life; 3 years difference between 18 and 21 is a lot to learn from life. As a result we might decrease the number of new smokers because they will have full potential to decide what to do at this age than 18 years old.

If 90% of United States smokers could have another chance to redo it, they reported that they would not even have their first puff that initiated their tobacco addiction (Winickoff, Gottlieb, and Mello 2014). The Tobacco 21 bill is a fairly new legislation and already it has shown a decline in underage smokers as a result of its implementation. The results of the survey presented that the public opinion was largely accepting and supportive of the bill. The main argument against the bill is the harm that will come to retailers of tobacco products. Correspondingly, the argument is proven inaccurate and in favor of the bill. The past has shown the improved outcome of the country from the raise in the minimum alcohol age, and researchers regard

I also have observed the patients of cardio vascular diseases. According to my personal observations, about 79% patients were early smokers who start to smoke at age 16 or less than 18. So that is why I also personally believe that we should take some serious steps to protect our young generation from getting involved in bad habit of smoking. I think that increasing the minimum legal age to 21 years for smoking will be a good step in this regard.

According to Joshua Berlinger and Andy Rose, ever since California raised the smoking age to 21 there has been a quarter-million premature deaths and 50,000 fewer deaths from lung cancer. The smoking age should be increased to 21 in all states because it would save many more lives and it would be harder for teens to get tobacco and vapor products.

Addiction and substance abuse is a personal fear in most people worldwide. Young people are more susceptible to experimenting with tobacco and alcohol, than middle aged or older people are. Most people reported smoking at the age or eighteen, when they could legally purchase

Furthermore, state and local governments and corporations seem puzzled with how to treat electronic cigarettes in public and in the workplace. Most cities have already outlawed smoking regular cigarettes in public places. Most corporations banned the use of cigarettes on the job years ago and even have designated times and places to light up. Do electronic cigarette smokers face the same destiny? Many city and state officials hope so. The introduction of the electronic cigarette has provided the perfect loop-hole for smokers to avoid breaking the law and left lawmakers perplexed until now. Minnesota has set forth a bill that will ban the use of electronic cigarettes anywhere that conventional cigarettes are banned on the basis that "there is no way for the public to know what harmful chemicals are in e-cigarettes or the amount of nicotine inhaled (Irmen)." Through a recent phone survey conducted by Blue Cross Blue Shield of Minnesota, seventy nine percent of

Stores often sell cigarettes to teenagers, because they don’t ID and they just want the money, if teens bribe them. Store cashiers, just not get in trouble, get “distracted” so the teenagers can grab it from the store shelf. Sometimes it’s not even the cashiers fault.

Cigars and smoking have been around in recorded history since Christopher Columbus sailed to the New World in 1492. For a long time smoking was thought to be healthy, however it has been proven dangerous for the body numerous times in many forms. Many people suggest that smoking at the legal age is too young to start smoking. The legal smoking age should be raised to twenty-one because smoking can cause numerous types of cancers, smoking can correspond with the legal drinking age, and smoking can cause physical disabilities.

SB 151/AB-8 seeks to decrease tobacco addiction in California by severely limiting youth access to tobacco products by increasing the age of sale for tobacco products to 21 years old. Adolescent brains are more prone to tobacco addiction and by the age of 21, if a person is a non-smoker, they are less likely to become a smoker. This bill is an extension to current legislature, the STAKE Act, which prohibits sale of tobacco products to persons under age of 18 years old. There have been proven negative health effects due to smoking and have contributed to the increase in health care costs due to smoking-related-illnesses.

A 2002 study performed by the Research Triangle Institute states that the tobacco companies make 1.8 billion dollars annually from underage sales. It is interesting that they are making such large profits when it is illegal for a person under the age of 18 to purchase cigarettes. A recent survey by the The American Lung Association indicated that among students under 18 years old who were current smokers, 69.4% reported never being asked for proof of age when buying cigarettes in a store, and 62.4% were not refused purchase because of their age.

I smoked cigarettes from 18 years old until 33 years old. I enjoyed smoking. It started with me and other kids trying to be cool and rebellious. This was before all the no smoking laws and stop smoking commercials were heavily used. When I