Statement from ASH Executive Director Laurent Huber
Monday, February 4, 2019
ASH fully supports Hawaii’s proposal to phase cigarettes out of the Hawaiian market by 2024. Cigarettes are highly engineered nicotine delivery devices designed to be as addictive as possible, and as a result, they kill half of their long term consumers. There is no other consumer good in the market that is as dangerous as cigarettes.
Phasing cigarettes out of the market will prevent millions of premature deaths in Hawaii and will also result in millions in health expenditures savings. This is not prohibition as it does not make the possession or use of tobacco illegal, it merely phases a ridiculously toxic and dangerous product out of the market.
This is something that would be done with any new product entering the market today with properties similar to cigarettes.
