McConnell wants to raise the minimum age to buy tobacco at age 21: NPR

Updated at 15:04 ET

The Senate Majority Leader, Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., Announced that he would introduce national legislation to raise the minimum age for the purchase of tobacco products from 18 to 21 years. years. Some tobacco advocates fear that the plan will harm children by ruling out any other regulations. efforts.

McConnell's proposal, from a major tobacco producing state, was presented Thursday at a conference with the Louisville-based Foundation for a Healthy Kentucky. He received over $ 160,000 in contributions from Altria, a leading cigarette maker.

McConnell said he was stimulated by an "unprecedented increase" in the number of teens who smoked or smoked electronic cigarettes.

"We have an epidemic of nicotine consumption through cigarettes or vaping in high schools and even colleges, not only in our state but throughout the country," he said.

McConnell plans to introduce a bill next month. "This will be a top priority I will work on," he added.

According to the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, 12 states have already raised the minimum purchase age to 21 with the so-called "tobacco 21" laws.

The McConnell announcement has been hailed by the giants of the tobacco industry, who claim that they support the increase in age when buying products tobacco. "By raising the minimum age to 21 years, no high school student will be able to legally purchase tobacco products, which is an additional hurdle to help reduce social access", Altria said in a press release.

Yet some members of the anti-smoking community are skeptical about what is really happening.

Matthew Myers, president of the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Children, said the organization had not yet taken a stand on McConnell's legislation because she had not seen the bill yet. . But Myers was concerned that tobacco companies are trying to include special interest provisions that would hinder the protection of children.

"Congress must not allow tobacco companies to use tobacco legislation as a Trojan horse for provisions that benefit the industry to the detriment of children and public health," he said. he told NPR by email.

He says tobacco companies have worked to include state provisions limiting the regulation of tobacco products, including flavored tobacco products.

At the federal level, a provision introduced by Rep. Robert Aderholt, R-Ala., Would allow certain items, such as the IQOS heated tobacco product, to be classified as vapor-based products, thus escaping stricter regulation than cigarettes.

Stanton Glantz, director of the Center for Tobacco Control Research and Education at the University of California at San Francisco, told NPR that tobacco companies were trying to "co-opt" a movement of child protection. "They are trying to take the lead by introducing a bad bill that prevents good bills from giving the impression that they support a health-promoting situation," he said.

Glantz says that the provisions supported by tobacco companies may criminalize young people who buy tobacco products rather than the retailers who sell them, while other provisions have a meaningless implementation language that makes them laws more difficult to apply.

"To bring McConnell, it's like the biggest weapon you can bring," he says.

Philip Morris International told NPR that it had pending applications to the US Food and Drug Administration to market its IQOS product in the United States. "Increasing the legal age of purchase of tobacco and nicotine products can play an important role in protecting against the use of these products by young people," he said. say Ryan Sparrow says. "However, this process must first start with the companies themselves.

In a written statement, a spokeswoman for Juul, a widespread electronic cigarette, told the company to support "category-wide actions aimed at reversing the trend in use by youth, while preserving this unprecedented opportunity for adult smokers, and we will continue to work with federal, state, and local policy makers in a transparent and collaborative manner to achieve this goal. "

Altria, the parent company of Philip Morris USA, has taken a major stake in Juul.

In an email, a spokeswoman for Altria said the company was supporting "simple tobacco bills. … We remain fully committed to pursuing this legislative objective unconditionally."

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the state of McConnell, Kentucky, has one of the highest cancer death rates in the country. With West Virginia, Kentucky also has the highest rates of smoking-related deaths.

The honorable senator says that the bill will respect the current system, which empowers retailers to check the age of anyone who buys tobacco. The measure will also benefit from an exemption for members of the military, which anti-smoking groups have urged Congress not to propose.