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When it comes to public health, we should follow facts and science, not politics. If history has taught us anything, it is that banning is rarely the answer when dealing with public health problems. This tends to have the opposite effect, spurring consumption of more products and spurring an unregulated black market. This is the approach taken by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
Look at the early 1920’s. Hard his average annual liquor consumption per capita jumped as much as 11.64% while alcohol was banned nationwide. Not only were people consuming more, but the products they were consuming were more potent.The potency of the products that circulated in the underground market during Prohibition was more potent than those produced before and after Prohibition. estimated to be over 150%.
So when President Biden recently announced plans to release a proposed rule that could eliminate nearly 98% of the nicotine in cigarettes by May 2023, it’s hard not to see it as the 21st century “ban.” . We know it doesn’t work for alcohol, so why would this administration think banning nicotine in cigarettes is different?
No one wants their children to smoke, but the latest National Youth Tobacco Survey by the FDA and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) shows that adolescents’ use of combustible tobacco is trending even lower, and conventional smoking is now in decline. Only 1.5% of students report. She has restricted her use of cigarettes since Congress passed a law in 2019 raising the smoking age to her 21. Instead of addressing the core concerns of youth e-cigarette use, the proposed rule would simply pull the rug away from more than 30 million adults, essentially giving up smoking cold turkey or breaking Prohibition. Get your fix through the illicit marketplace, just like the times.
In New York City alone, more than half of the cigarettes smoked are now smuggled in response to tobacco tax increases. Can you imagine the impact of Biden’s federal proposals across the country? A surge in black market sales is increasing funding for organized crime and less funding for “family-run” corner stores. Moreover, the illicit tobacco market has been found to fund terrorist organizations abroad, so it would not be surprising if tobacco bans were directly related to the financing of terrorist organizations such as Hamas and Hezbollah.
Instead of pushing for tobacco bans, the administration needs to implement tactics to reduce the harm of tobacco, just as it did marijuana and opioid use. Harm reduction has been proven to work. For example, when it comes to combating the HIV crisis, cities with needle and syringe programs saw HIV prevalence decline by an average of 18.6% per year, compared to It is growing at an average annual rate of 8.1%.
The Biden administration could donate $712 million annually to the Tobacco Products Center to educate adults about tobacco alternatives. Countries such as Japan, the United Kingdom, and Sweden have done this, with significant reductions in tobacco consumption as they transition into adulthood. Or, if Biden really wants to get serious about reducing nicotine use, the FDA should be asked by Congress to better regulate synthetic nicotine, the main ingredient in e-cigarette products such as puff bars popular with young people. You must encourage them to exercise their powers.
Prohibitions will not lead to smoking cessation, but they could spur more illicit tobacco consumption and even raise national security concerns. It’s time to universally apply the harm reduction approach.
An Adjunct Professor at Georgetown University, Richard Marianos is a Senior Law Enforcement Consultant who has worked for the US Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) Office for over 27 years. He was the Assistant Director of the Office of Public and Government Affairs and the Special Agent in charge of the ATF’s Washington Field Division.
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