MINNEAPOLIS -- Last week, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) released a study that concludes raising the minimum legal age to purchase tobacco products “will likely prevent or delay initiation of tobacco use by adolescents and young adults.” The Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act, the federal law that granted the U.S. Food and Drug Administration the authority to regulate tobacco products, required the FDA to convene an expert panel to conduct a study on the public health implications of raising the minimum age to purchase tobacco products and submit a report to Congress on the results of the study.
In 2013, the FDA contracted with the IOM to conduct the minimum age study, specifically requesting that the study focus on raising the legal minimum age to 21 and 25. It is important to note that the IOM study does not make a recommendation that the legal minimum age to purchase tobacco products should be raised, but only focuses on the question of whether there would be a public health impact of increasing the age to buy tobacco products. Moreover, the FDA does not have the authority to change current federal law that makes 18 the legal age to purchase tobacco products. Any change to the legal minimum age on the federal level would need to be made by Congress.
In the study, the IOM concluded that the age group most impacted by raising the legal age would be 15 to 17 year olds. Specifically, the IOM committee stated that “the impact of raising the MLA [minimum legal age] to 21 will likely be substantially higher than raising it to 19. However, the added effect of raising the MLA from 21 to 25 will likely be considerably less.”
The IOM’s study models project that by the time today’s teenagers turn adult age, there would be a “3% decrease in prevalence of tobacco use among those adults if the MLA were raised to 19, a 12% decrease if raised to 21, and a 16% decreased if raised to 25.” However, the IOM study also concludes that over time, increasing the minimum age will “likely lead to substantial reductions in smoking-related mortality, though results from the models suggest that these results will not be observed for at least 30 years, assuming that the MLA increase occurs now.”
In response to the IOM study announcement, NATO issued a press release statement to over 200 newspapers, television stations, magazines, and other media outlets. The press release noted that the problem of underage tobacco use would continue to persist until there is a credible effort to change the willingness of adults of any age to legally buy and then provide tobacco products to underage youth. While the Institute of Medicine study states that raising the legal age to 21 will substantially reduce the number of 15 to 17 year olds who begin to smoke or use tobacco products, doing so does not address the issue of those minors who rely on family members or other people age 21 or older to obtain cigarettes and tobacco products.
Moreover, the NATO statement indicated that if a higher legal age is enacted, the same outcome will arise with 18, 19, and 20 year-old adults who currently use tobacco products. That is, these young adults would likely turn to adults 21 or older to purchase tobacco products for them.
Finally, the NATO press release states that adults should have the right to choose for themselves whether they want to purchase legal products, including legal tobacco products. Since adults aged 18, 19 and 20 can vote and serve in the military, they should be allowed to exercise their right to choose what legal products they desire to purchase and use.
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