Todd Young’s Bill Would Bar Those Under 21 From Buying Tobacco Products

By Emily Ketterer
TheStatehouseFile.com

INDIANAPOLIS –– Indiana Sen. Todd Young said now is the time to act to stop teens from smoking, as more reports of cases of lung illnesses with links to the use of e-cigarettes rise.

Young’s legislation in Congress, the Tobacco 21 Act, would prohibit the sale of tobacco products, including e-cigarettes, to anyone under the age of 21. Current law allows anyone over the age of 18 to purchase tobacco products.

Multiple news outlets have recently reported that across 14 states there have been almost 100 cases of lung illnesses a linked to vaping e-cigarettes, many involving teens and young adults.

Young, a Republican, said in an interview Tuesday that he believes these reports show the urgency to pass this act. 

“I’m hearing now more than ever that we have to act now. We have a nationwide epidemic on our hands,” Young said.

He added that between 2017 and 2018 there was nearly an 80% increase in e-cigarette usage among high school students, and 95% of smokers begin smoking before the age of 21.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimate that approximately 4.9 million middle and high school students across the nation used some type of tobacco product last year, particularly e-cigarettes and vaping. 

“This is as serious as a public health crisis as you can have. Especially because we are talking about our state’s children,” Young said.

He said raising the age from 18 to 21 won’t outright solve the issue of young people smoking, but changing the law will help the cause. 

“When I was born, it was fashionable in a lot of circles to use tobacco products, and over the course of my very short lifetime, we’ve been able to reverse that trend,” Young said. “With the increase in e-cigarette and vaping usage … the real risk here is we’re going to begin to normalize a behavior that had been for a generation, regarded as harmful.”

Young held a press conference Monday with Teens for Tobacco 21, a student organization at Floyd Central High School in Floyds Knobs, Indiana. The students involved spoke out against the use of tobacco, including sophomore Myla Tissandier.

“We appreciate the efforts that Sen. Young and his team are taking to make ‘T21’ a federal issue and encourage them to make the legislation a reality, so my generation’s future doesn’t have to go up in smoke,” Tissandier said in a statement Monday.

Advocates for the change in the law sit on both sides of the aisle in Congress, Young said, with Democrat Sen. Brian Schatz of Hawaii signed on as a co-author and support from the majority leader, Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Kentucky. 

The act will likely be added into larger legislation in the U.S. Senate that will address other public health concerns before going to a full vote as early as September, Young said. 

FOOTNOTE: Emily Ketterer is a reporter for TheStatehouseFile.com, a news website powered by Franklin College journalism students.