Tobacco 21 rules spread quickly, reaching majority of KC metro area

The campaign to prevent teen smoking in Kansas City is moving faster than anyone expected.

Nearly half of residents of the metro area now must be 21 to buy tobacco products. So far, 15 metro area cities have passed the ordinances, and talks are underway in Liberty, Lee’s Summit and Tonganoxie.

For a local campaign that began in October, it’s made a lot of progress, said Jessica Hembree, program officer for the Health Care Foundation of Greater Kansas City, one of the organizations spearheading Tobacco 21 in the area.

That’s thanks to a partnership between public health advocates and the business community, organizers say.

Cutting smoking rates is a straightforward public health proposition, but it also is surprisingly beneficial for local businesses.

Two years ago, Scott Hall and other representatives of the Greater Kansas City Chamber of Commerce met with public health experts to discuss ways to make Kansas City stand out, and they realized how important public health was in advancing a city’s image. Hall and representatives from businesses and public health groups built the Healthy KC coalition, which included tobacco cessation on its platform.

“In the 21st century, communities that are the healthiest are communities that grow the fastest and are the strongest,” said Hall, who now leads the chamber’s Healthy KC initiative. “Tobacco cessation is a key part of building that healthy community.”

An Institute of Medicine report concluded that if all states raised the legal age to 21, there would be a 12 percent drop in teen and young adult smokers. And if kids don’t start smoking early, they’re much less likely to be addicted to nicotine and develop tobacco-related health problems later in life.

“Ninety-five percent of adult smokers start before the age of 21,” said John Schachter, spokesman in Washington, D.C., for the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids. “And 90 percent start when they’re 18 or younger.”

Halting that engagement rate has huge benefits for individuals and their future employers.

One-third of smokers eventually die from tobacco-related diseases. Raising the age to purchase tobacco is estimated to prevent 1,000 young adults from becoming smokers each year, thus stopping 333 preventable deaths. Additionally, employers can expect to save $5.8 million a year in health care costs.

Public health experts have been advocating limited access to tobacco for a long time, Hall said, but the chamber really got on board when it saw the statistics that indicate it cuts costs for employers.

“Many CEOs in the region are realizing the impact of health on their bottom line. It’s not just health insurance; it’s absenteeism for health problems, and it’s also presenteeism, the ability to show up and do your work without needing a nicotine fix.”

Traditionally, anti-tobacco campaigns focused on raising tobacco taxes, and many felt that those tax increases unfairly targeted smokers. Tobacco 21 has encountered less opposition, Hall said, because it happens at the local level and because it focuses on teens and young adults.

“This effort specifically targets youth, and people understand that,” he said. “Tobacco 21 is really about tobacco prevention.”

Tobacco 21 ordinances also give cities the power to regulate e-cigarettes, which until recently were virtually unregulated by the federal government.

Kansas City provides an example to health and business coalitions in other cities, Hall said.

“It is a powerful example of what can be done to drive public health when health experts and the business community work together,” he said. “The marriage of the two has been the thing that has driven this so fast.”

Cities like Portland, Maine, and New York City have raised the legal age to buy tobacco products, and some states are passing legislation. Hawaii and California legislatures have raised the age across the state to 21, and legislation has been introduced in Massachusetts, New Jersey and the District of Columbia.

This story was originally published July 22, 2016 at 4:03 PM with the headline "Tobacco 21 rules spread quickly, reaching majority of KC metro area."