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Sponsors
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History
- Referred to health
Full text
The text isn't available here yet. Check nysenate.gov.
Sponsor's memo
Title of bill
An act to amend the public health law, in relation to prohibiting the sale of tobacco products, herbal cigarettes, rolling papers or pipes to persons under nineteen years of age
Purpose
To reduce the use of tobacco products by teenagers.
Summary of provisions
Section 1. and subdivisions 2, 3, and 7 of section 1399-cc of public health law, section heading and subdivision 2 as amended by chapter 508 of the laws of 2000, subdivision 3 as separately amended by Chapter 508 of the laws of 200 and chapter 162 of the laws of 2002 and subdivision 7 as amended by chapter 13 of the laws of 2003.
Justification
The United States Department of Health and Human Services estimates that more than 3,000 children nationwide start smoking every day, and that more than three million American children under age 18 consume more than 947 million packs of cigarettes annually. The use of tobacco products and smoking is almost always initiated and established in adolescence, typically by 16 years of age. Because nicotine addiction occurs during adolescence, adolescent tobacco users are likely to become adult tobacco users. Tobacco is generally the first drug used by young people who enter a sequence of drug use that can include alcohol, marijuana, and harder drugs, the purchase, possession, or use of which by minors is already prohibited by law.
The prohibition on the sale of tobacco products to persons under the age of 19 may help reduce the number of teenage smokers by reducing peer access. Underage smokers typically acquire cigarettes from their high school peers who are the age of 18 which is the current legal age of purchasing tobacco products. Raising the age to 19 may help alleviate this process because most teens graduate high school before their 19th birthday.
Currently, the states of Alabama, Alaska, New Jersey and Utah have already implemented laws to raise the age of purchasing tobacco products to 19. The New York counties of Nassau, Suffolk and Onondaga have also implemented local laws which raise the tobacco purchasing age to 19. It must be the public policy of this State to deter children and adolescents from using tobacco products and thereby seek to protect them from the possible affliction of tobacco-related disease, disability, and death.
Legislative history
New bill.
Fiscal implications
State will incur future cost-savings in health costs by the possible reduction of tobacco use.
Effective date
This bill shall take effect immediately.
Summaries, headlines and scores are AI-generated from the official bill text. How we score bills. Source: NYS Open Legislation.