If a lawmaker in Hawaii has his way, the legal age to buy cigarettes in the state will be raised to 100 — one century old — in five years.
State Rep. Richard Creagan, who’s an emergency room doctor, introduced the new legislation, which calls for a phased ban on cigarette sales. The legal age for purchase would raise from the current age 21 to 30 by next year, then up to 40, 50 and 60 in each following year, until it’s raised to 100 by 2024.
The raised age limit wouldn’t apply to e-e-cigarettes, cigars or chewing tobacco.
Creagan told the Hawaii Tribune-Herald that smokers have been, quote, “enslaved by a ridiculously bad industry — which has enslaved them by designing a cigarette that is highly addictive, knowing that it highly lethal.”
The legislation notes the $100 million that Hawaii gets each year from cigarette sales taxes, calling it the state’s “own addiction,” and one reason for the bill’s increasing legal age for purchase over several years is to give Hawaii time to find ways to adjust to the lost tax revenue.
Creagan said he’s confident that if the legislation becomes law, it would survive any court challenges
