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"Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids" Issues Memo on House Tobacco Vote

So far this year, Congress has failed to take advantage of the historic opportunity to protect kids from tobacco. The Senate effectively killed the McCain tobacco bill in June, and the House of Representatives has not stepped up to the plate to make tobacco legislation happen. And just a few weeks ago, Congress further demonstrated its inability to enact solutions that work, and instead it supported what merely sounds good: in this case, penalizing kids for possession of tobacco.

This provision -- an amendment to the appropriations bill for the District of Columbia -- would punish kids in Washington, D.C., for possession of tobacco products. Yet, this amendment would do nothing to hold responsible the tobacco companies that market their products to children. It also fails to address the fact that over 40 percent of retailers in D.C. still sell to kids. The amendment is remarkably similar to a key provision of the House Republican Leadership plan that, as outlined, would do little to reduce tobacco use among kids.

This is a perfect of example of how Congress has been focusing on paper-tiger solutions while failing to enact the policies that every public health organization in the country has said are critical to reducing tobacco use among kids. While Congress fails to take meaningful action, approximately 3,000 young people begin smoking every day, and 1,000 of them are porjected to die prematurely from tobacco-caused disease.

There is no silver bullet to reducing tobacco use, but penalizing kids, in the absence of other effective policies, will do little to end tobacco's grip on the children. A thoughtful, comprehensive plan to reduce tobacco use among children must first ensure that adults who illegally sell to kids -- and the tobacco companies who illegally market to them -- are held responsible. There is little evidence to indicate that in the absence of a concerted, comprehensive program, penalizing kids will work to reduce tobacco use rates.

The tobacco companies have been addicting kids for decades, thus ensuring a replacement market for adults who either die from or quit smoking. The $5 billion the tobacco industry spends each year for advertising and marketing its products works: 85 percent of kids who smoke use the three most heavily advertised brands. Like their peers elsewhere in the United States, kids in the nation's capital continually see tobacco ads on billboards, bus shelters, storefronts and in stores.

In addition, focusing on penalizing kids will further divert resources away from effective enforcement of current laws that prohibit retailers from selling to kids. According to the Department of Health and Human Services, compliance checks reveal that more than 42 percent of retailers in the District of Columbia sell tobacco to minors. And a recent sting operation on Capitol Hill showed that even in the U.S. Capitol building itself, retailers are selling tobacco to children.

The vote comes on the heels of a move by the tobacco industry's allies in Congress to prevent the District of Columbia from filing a lawsuit -- as some 40 states have -- to recover Medicaid costs associated with smoking related illness, even though most of the states that these Members represent in Congress stand to gain from the settlement.

We believe any discussion of holding children responsible should only come after -- or as part of -- a comprehensive approach, which holds adults responsible for marketing and selling to kids. Congress has taken no meaningful steps this year to protect kids from tobacco. In that context, this vote sets a poor precedent, creating tobacco programs that are ineffective at best, and potentially harmful at worst.

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