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THE MASSACHUSETTS Health Officers Association and its tobacco control program applaud Steve Moore’s assertion that he sells “cigarettes to persons of legal age’’ (“Smoking out the nanny state,’’ Op-ed, Aug. 30). We wish that that were always the case in retail stores, for if it were, youth smoking rates would be much lower, illegal sales to minors would be nonexistent, and in Massachusetts, we would make smoking history.
Because of programs like the one that hosted the retail training that Moore attended and critiqued, youth smoking rates have dropped from 30 percent in 1993 to 17 percent in 2007.
In 2009, the rate of sales to minors during compliance checks in communities that receive funding through the Massachusetts Tobacco Cessation and Prevention Program was 7.8 percent, but in communities without funding, the sale rate was more than double that. In funded communities this sale rate continues to decline.
This is not the result of an overextended “nanny state,’’ but rather public health in action.
A report issued jointly by the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education and the Department of Public Health in March states that Massachusetts youth are switching from cigarettes to other tobacco products such as cigars and smokeless tobacco.
Along with knowing who to ask for identification and what types of identification are acceptable, it is important for retail clerks who work for tobacco vendors to be informed about emerging tobacco products.
We commend the local boards of health that have worked to prevent this generation of young people from becoming regular smokers and suffering the associated health risks.
source: boston.com