Federal smoking age to rise

On Friday, President Donald Trump signed a $1.4 trillion spending package that included a measure to raise the age for buying tobacco from 18 to 21. The tobacco provision makes it a violation of federal law to sell tobacco to anyone under 21, and applies to all tobacco products, including e-cigarettes and vaping cartridges. The law is not immediate; it will go into effect in the summer of 2020 across the country. According to Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, 19 states had already raised the legal age to buy tobacco products to 21.

Youth tobacco use has been growing for the first time in more than 17 years after the introduction of e-cigarettes and other flavored tobacco products. A 2016 Minnesota Department of Education study found that more than one in three Cloquet 11th-graders had used e-cigarettes in the previous 30 days. Studies also show that almost 90 percent of adult smokers started before they were 21.