Candy Flavored Cigarettes: Still a Danger for Youth
Since the mid-1960s, cigarette manufacturers have been targeting youth, ages 12 to 21, to smoke cigarettes by adding different flavors, such as menthol, to their cigarettes. The flavored cigarette business has continued to add new, “cool” flavors such as cinnamon and spice, vanilla, lemon menthol, berry, watermelon, and mocha. Additionally, the cigarettes are packaged in shiny, colorful tins with cartoons or hip-hop images, making it very appealing to youth.
The fruit- and candy-flavored enhanced cigarettes are just as addicting and harmful as traditional cigarettes and can provide a gateway for youth to develop severe tobacco addiction or to start using alcohol and other illicit drugs. According to the American Lung Association, approximately 4,000 kids smoke their first cigarette each day and one-third of those will become addicted.
The good news is that on June 22, 2009, President Obama signed a new anti-tobacco law, the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act, to allow the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to help monitor and control the advertising and sale of tobacco products, including flavored cigarettes, to youth.
For more info:
Smoking and Teens Fact Sheet – American Lung Association site
http://www.lungusa.org/atf/cf/%7B7A8D42C2-FCCA-4604-8ADE-7F5D5E762256%7D/candyreport.pdf
Obama signs bill putting tobacco products under FDA oversight – CNN.com
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