The White Buffalo on Chapel Street.
Could New Haven become the next Connecticut city to raise the age for purchasing tobacco products? It will if Ken Farbstein has anything to say about it.
Farbstein, an advocate for limiting tobacco use to adults, stopped by the December monthly meeting of the Dwight Community Management Team to talk to neighbors about a campaign in Connecticut to raise the age on tobacco purchases, particularly a sizzling-hot new product called the JUUL.
An e‑cigarette that has become a popular tool for adults looking to break their tobacco addiction, the JUUL, in particular, is seen as an open door for nicotine addiction among teens. So popular is JUUL that Altria Group Inc., the parent company of Philip Morris USA, this week negotiated to purchase 35 percent of the tech startup for $12.8 billion.
Farbestein was at the management team meeting in an effort to warn about the dangers of such devices but also to garner support for raising the age for tobacco purchases in New Haven to 21. This year, Massachusetts successfully banned the sale of tobacco products in pharmacies and now regulates the sale of e‑cigarettes. And it did that after it raised the age of sale for tobacco from 18 to 21.
Farbstein passed around several packages of cheap, candy-flavored cigars that you can find in any bodega or non-CVS pharmacy, sometimes three or two to a pack for a mere 99 cents. Farbstein told those gathered that such products are aimed at attracting the young smoker. A neighbor pointed out that they also are marketed to those who have low-incomes and are most vulnerable to health problems, particularly those battling mental illness.
“Almost half of all cigarettes are smoked by people with some sort of mental health condition,” Farbstein said. “The challenge of that is when they do smoke, they smoke a lot.”
He noted that the e‑cigarettes are particularly dangerous for young people who might erroneously think such products are safe because they’re not receiving the nicotine by inhaling tobacco smoke. The e‑cigarettes vaporize the nicotine and often enhance the taste with fruit or candy-like flavors, which makes them more appealing to young people. A new study suggests that is hooking young people, with 1 in 5 high school seniors saying they vaped a nicotine product in the last 30 days. (Read more about that here.)
“The nicotine is vaporized from these flavor pods which have as much nicotine as a pack of cigarettes,” he said.
Farbstein pass around examples of tobacco products aimed at teens.
Farbstein — who served as the grassroots campaign coordinator for a group called Tobacco Free Mass through December 2015 and now represents a group called Network for the Improvement of Addiction Treatment (NIATx) — noted teen brains continue to develop until the age of 25. That means the likelihood of getting hooked on nicotine will be greater if a person makes the decision to consume large quantities before that maturity happens. (Read this New York Times’ story about how JUUL addiction has played out in the suburbs of Massachusetts and another about how it helps people quit smoking.)
Such products are also appealing to the young because of the technology associated with them, he said. They can be charged much like one’s cell phone or other portable electronic devices — right into a computer. The federal Food and Drug Administration has found that vaping has increased nearly 80 percent among high schoolers and 50 percent among middle schoolers since last year.
Why not raise the age to 25? one management team member asked Farbman. He responded that if young people can be held off until at least the age of 21, there is a greater chance that they won’t ever touch such products at all.
Another neighbor asked whether the high cost of smoking in Connecticut isn’t a deterrent to smoking for young people. Farbstein said that e‑cigarettes are a surprisingly affordable option once you get past the initial price of a starter kit, which is about $50. A four pack of refills is only about $15, whereas one pack of cigarettes is about $10.
JUUL: We’re With You
E‑cigarettes, JUULs in particular, have been in health advocates’ crosshairs because the effects on teen brains. On Tuesday the U.S. Surgeon General Jerome Adams issued a public health advisory warning against the uses of such products by teens and calling for new regulations to beat back their rising popularity.
According to a statement from Victoria Davis, JUUL Labs’ senior director of communications, the company shares the surgeon general’s desire to prevent young people from becoming addicted to nicotine.
“We are committed to preventing youth access of JUUL products,” Davis said in the statement on the maker’s website. “We cannot fulfill our mission to provide the world’s one billion adult smokers with a true alternative to combustible cigarettes if youth use continues unabated. As we said before, our intent was never to have youth use JUUL products. We have taken dramatic action to contribute to [solving] this problem, which is why we implemented the JUUL Labs Action Plan to address underage use of JUUL products.”
Davis said that JUUL Labs had stopped distributing certain flavor pods to retail stores a month ago, strengthened age verification on its site, and eliminated its social media presence. She said the company also is “developing new technology to further limit youth access and use.”
“We are committed to working with the Surgeon General, FDA, state Attorneys General, local municipalities, and community organizations as a transparent and responsible partner in this effort,” she said in the statement.
Yale-New Haven Hospital Senior Vice-President Andy Oreffice said that New Haven is no stranger to pushing for change around tobacco use. Three years ago the city passed an ordinance that declared public areas such as government buildings, playgrounds, sports fields, school grounds, and Lighthouse Park tobacco-free zones. The city has the power to create and restrict smokers to specific spaces within public areas.
The Tobacco 21 legislation took off in Massachusetts and is gaining traction in Connecticut, Oreffice said, pointing to the passage of such an ordinance in Hartford. Hartford’s City Council voted in October to raise the age. Though Hartford’s ordinance doesn’t prevent those who are at least 18 from smoking it does prevent the sale of tobacco products to those who are under 21, imposing a fine on businesses that violate the new regulation. The ordinance goes into effect in April.
The Dwight Community Management Team voted to provide a letter of support which Farbstein said will ultimately go to the Board of Alders.
White Buffalo: Good Idea
The White Buffalo on Chapel Street.
If the Board of Alders decides to embark on Tobacco 21 legislation, it won’t find any opposition from the owners of The White Buffalo, a downtown vape shop on Chapel Street.
“I don’t think we would be opposed to Tobacco 21 ordinance,” said one of the owners, who preferred not to give his name. “Anything that helps keep tobacco and nicotine out of the hands of minors.”
He noted that he started smoking cigarettes when he was 13. He said vaping is first and foremost a tool for quitting smoking; the idea isn’t to continue to vape forever. The White Buffalo carries the ever popular JUUL.
“There are a number of reasons that people like it,” the owner said. “I think it’s the ease of use.” He noted that old-school e‑cigarettes have to be loaded up in. But JUUL, much like the Keurig coffee maker and its ubiquitous K‑cups, operates with prefilled pods that you can pop in and out.
“Much like the Keurig, it’s got a sleek design,” he said. “And it delivers a very satisfying hit of nicotine. It works really well as a cessation device because it allows people to easily go to it from regular cigarettes. It’s very seamless.”
The co-owner of the shop noted that the other reason JUUL is so popular is that it isn’t restricted to specialty stores like The White Buffalo. JUUL is available at bodegas and gas stations and most any other place you can buy tobacco products. A place like The White Buffalo has a narrow audience — they don’t sell anything that anyone under 18 currently can buy — not even the batteries that go in an e‑cigarette device.
Another law proposed that will not be obeyed or enforced. Young people learn from the adults they are around. If smoking is accepted and practiced in their family there is a heavy probability that they will become smokers. If the adults in the house do not smoke, and point out the hazards of smoking there is a high probability that the young people raised in the house will not smoke. Simple logic but true.