Repeal of flavored tobacco ban is the right move
To the editor:
Central Falls Ward 5 City Councilor Thomas Lazieh showed the thoughtful courage to do the right thing by calling for the repeal of the city’s 2015 ban on the sale of flavored tobacco products to legal aged adults.
The ban was put in place with the argument that preventing retailers from selling flavored products to adults would prevent minors from experimenting with tobacco.
The fact is, it is and always has been illegal for retailers to sell all tobacco products to minors, including those with flavors. The ban on flavors did not magically make it more illegal. The ban also failed to recognize that the world doesn’t end at the city line, and flavored tobacco continues to be widely available in nearby communities, and through the Internet.
One need only to look at rampant student use of e-cigarettes in our schools to see evidence that banning products failed as a policy. These kids are not getting these products by purchasing them at a local retailer. They are getting tobacco products from the Internet and social sources – friends and family. They are getting tobacco because health officials have, Footloose-style, made it cool to try to break the rules, which is not the sort of encouragement teens need.
At the same time, Councilor Lazieh has had the wisdom to recognize that leading health officials from the FDA, and the American Cancer Society among others, have recognized that e-cigarettes, though not perfect, are a less harmful alternative for adults who would like to stop smoking cigarettes. This is not the popular narrative from anti-tobacco advocates who brand anyone who recognizes this fact as a shill for “Big Tobacco,” but they are wrong. Harm reduction is a public health strategy that has been applied to everything from the AIDS to the opioid crisis, and now it is being applied to the harm from smoking combustible tobacco. Councilor Lazieh’s call for the repeal of the flavor ban is actually advancing better health policies that will not only continue to prevent sales to minors, but will also give adults viable alternatives to buying another pack of traditional tobacco flavored smokes.
Dennis Lane, Executive Director, Coalition for Responsible Retailing