The Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, Current Cigarette Smoking Among Adults — United States, 2005–2015, which was released by Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, (CDC), rightly points out, in its opening statement, “Tobacco use is the leading cause of preventable disease and death in the United States”.
The downfall of increasing tobacco tax
In a statement that contrasts the above data Vincent Willmore, vice president for communication at the Center for Tobacco Free Kids, said, “Raising the tobacco tax is probably the single most effective way to reduce smoking, especially among kids”. Although everyone agrees that tobacco cigarettes should be heavily taxed, in order to deter new smokers from picking up the habit, and encourage current smokers to stop, there is one problem with this tax.
Vaping products, which are known to be effective smoking cessation devices and at least 95% safer than tobacco cigarettes, are put under the same umbrella as their combustible counterparts, therefore whatever tax tobacco cigarettes are subjected to, so are e-cigarettes. Californian voters have just approved a $2 a pack tax on Election Day, and whilst proposals for increased taxes on tobacco are popping up all over the US, such tax increases did not pass in Colorado and North Dakota.
The danger of classifying e-cigs as cigarettes
The CDC linked smoking to 40 percent of all cancer cases, and 30 percent of deaths caused by cancer. The government insists that it is working to reduce smoking rates to 12 percent of the adult population by the year 2020, and some of the ways it aims to achieve this are through implementing more regulations and higher taxes.
