Cooper's Bill Passed Unanimously
The Suffolk County Legislature at a meeting on Tuesday in Riverhead approved a ban on the sale of herbal cigarettes to minors. The tobacco-free but still dangerous product targets a younger clientele through the use of clever advertising ploys.
Suffolk County Legislator Jon Cooper (D-Huntington) last month introduced legislation seeking the ban on sales to minors. The County Legislature yesterday heeded the call, voting unanimously to approve the ban.
Cooper announced his legislation at the Hauppauge offices of the American Cancer Society, which strongly supported Cooper's efforts. The ACS maintains that herbal cigarettes can be just as dangerous as standard cigarettes. Though herbal cigarettes do not contain tobacco or nicotine, they do contain virtually all of the dangerous chemicals found in tobacco-based cigarettes and produce similar levels of carbon monoxide when smoked.
"The Legislature made the right move," Cooper said this week. The companies that produce herbal cigarettes aim to make smoking seem attractive to young kids. My legislation will make it tougher for herbal cigarette makers -- and ultimately tobacco companies — to sink their claws into our children."
When he introduced the legislation, Cooper was concerned about the potential impact of a marketing blitz by the makers of herbal cigarettes, which, despite the name, actually contain anything from wild lettuce to catnip. A multi-million dollar advertising campaign designed to position herbal cigarettes as the "healthy" alternative to tobacco-based cigarettes is just getting started. The packaging of the products is already geared toward a young audience: boxes feature cartoonish figures reminiscent of one major tobacco company's infamous "Joe Camel" advertising campaign.
Cooper's legislation makes it illegal for Suffolk County merchants to sell herbal cigarettes to anyone under the age of l8 and requires stores to display in prominent places signs indicating that the business complies with the law. Violators could be fined as much as $l,000 and be sentenced to as much as six months in jail.
