Orioles in support of tobacco-free stadiums
As an organization, we realize that now, more than ever, we have a responsibility to our city and our city’s children.
With a strong core of young players and an exciting season under our belts, we know on-field expectations for the Orioles are as high as they’ve been in decades.
As we prepare for an exciting 2024 season, we are also raising our own expectations off the field by supporting important measures to improve the health of our home city. That is why we are proud to support an ordinance before the Baltimore City Council that would prohibit the use of all tobacco and nicotine products, including smokeless tobacco, in Baltimore City stadiums.
Products like chew, dip and snuff have been used by professional ballplayers for decades and, whether intentional or otherwise, have led children who idolized them to adopt the same harmful habits. I recall grabbing a bag of Big League Chew, a popular chewing gum marketed toward young baseball players and modeled to resemble chewing tobacco, in an attempt to emulate my favorite baseball stars.
Now new products, like oral nicotine pouches, are re-creating the phenomenon and opening yet another front in the fight to prevent youth from beginning a lifetime of addiction and illness.
As an organization, we realize that now, more than ever, we have a responsibility to our city and our city’s children. Not only have we decided to support recent legislation introduced in the City Council, but we have also proactively banned tobacco products here at Camden Yards, as well as our spring training home in Sarasota.
This new mandate is fully endorsed by our general manager Mike Elias.
This policy also aligns with recent changes to MLB’s collective bargaining agreement with its players. These steps forward demonstrate that baseball is on a clear path toward a tobacco-free future, as our club now joins others in Major League Baseball and the entire Minor League Baseball system.
Recent studies state that traditional smokeless tobacco products contain at least 28 known carcinogens that can cause oral, pancreatic and esophageal cancer. We must take the same approach for smokeless tobacco as we do with all harmful products by directly addressing it with good public policy. The proposed legislation will fill a hole in our city’s current stadium policies, which generally prohibit the use of most other tobacco products, such as cigarettes, cigars, and e-cigarettes, but fail to include smokeless tobacco in their prohibitions.
Our efforts to prohibit the use of smokeless tobacco products in all stadiums are aligned with the work that Baltimore City’s Health Department is doing throughout city schools and in the community. It is a proactive measure to ensure kids do not see a particular behavior in their sports heroes that no one wants them to mimic.
We look forward to working with Baltimore City and youth sports leaders across the city to help Baltimoreans live happy and healthy lives. As we look forward to spring training, our fans will have a chance to cheer the O’s on to victory on the field while also seeing wins off the field with this important legislation before the Baltimore City Council.