US Doctors Urge To Raise Smoking Age to 21

In its new policy statement, the American Academy of Pediatrics calls on the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to expand its jurisdiction to include e-cigarettes, liquid nicotine and all other tobacco products. The statements outline recommendations for public policy changes, clinical guidance for physicians to counsel families on reducing exposure and dependence on tobacco, and recommendations for the regulation of e-cigarettes. This includes age restrictions, taxes, bans on advertising to youth, and bans on flavored products that are particularly attractive to youth.

Child-resistant packaging is critically needed to protect curious young children from exposure to liquid nicotine, according to the AAP.

“Right now there are states where you can sell an electronic cigarette to a 6-year-old”, said Karen Wilson, M.D., chair of the AAP Section on Tobacco Control.

Doctors say the growing popularity of e-cig’s is threatening a new generation of teens to become addicted to smoking. For this reason, the pediatricians’ group recommends that indoor and outdoor smoking bans in place for traditional cigarettes also be applied to e-cigarettes.

“Tobacco is unique among consumer products in that it severely injures and kills when used exactly as intended”, states the AAP policy statement.

The study, conducted by Imperial Tobacco, owner of the e-cigarette brand “blu”, tested a commercially available heated tobacco product called iQOS to assess whether the product generated side stream chemical emissions when activated.

Children are also at risk from the aerosol vapor that Wilson said has been described by e-cigarette companies as “a harmless water vapor”. Heated tobacco products are claimed to work by heating cigarettes at a lower temperature to vaporize nicotine and flavorings which are then inhaled.

“The jury on e-cigarettes remains out, but it is clear that carcinogens and potentially harmful substances are nonetheless present in this alternate nicotine delivery system”, said Dr. Jack Jacoub, director of thoracic oncology at Orange Coast Memorial Medical Center’s MemorialCare Cancer Institute in Fountain Valley, Calif.

“There is no safe way to use tobacco”, said Dr. Sandra G. Hassink, the academy’s president.

It has been more than 50 years since the U.S. Surgeon General’s first report on the health consequences of smoking, and tobacco products are still finding their way into the hands of children and adolescents across the country in increasingly diverse ways.