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Delaware joins states’ call for FDA to ban menthol cigarettes

February 3, 2021

Delaware Attorney General Kathleen Jennings has joined 22 other state and territorial attorneys general to call on the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to ban menthol cigarettes.

The letter reads, in part: “The effect of menthol cigarettes on youth smoking initiation has been well documented. Both the Tobacco Products Scientific Advisory Committee and the FDA menthol reports concluded that menthol cigarettes increase the number of children who experiment with cigarettes and the number of children who become regular smokers, thus increasing overall youth smoking. These young people who initiate using menthol cigarettes are more likely to become addicted and long-term daily smokers.”

Youth tobacco use is an ongoing epidemic impacting millions of American kids, driven in large part by flavored tobacco products – including the original flavored product: menthol cigarettes. Nationally, about half of all youth smokers smoke menthols. In Delaware, 13.6 percent of high school students actively use e-cigarettes, and 1,800 kids try cigarettes for the first time each year.

While the tobacco industry initially marketed menthol cigarettes as safer and healthier cigarettes, this could not be further from the truth. In fact, because menthol cigarettes are less harsh, they are associated with increased initiation and greater addiction, and the FDA found that it is likely that menthol cigarettes pose a public health risk above that seen with non-menthol cigarettes. The tobacco industry has also long targeted Black Americans with aggressive marketing for menthol cigarettes, leading to a devastating and unequal burden of death and disease.

For more information on the impact of menthol cigarettes and other flavored tobacco products in Delaware, go to flavorshookkidsdelaware.org.

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