President Bush Should Protect Kids, Not Big Tobacco By Signing Bill to Increase Cigarette Tax, Fund SCHIP
Statement of William V. Corr, Executive Director, Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids
Washington, D.C. — The U.S. Senate today put the health of America’s children first with a veto-proof majority voting for a 61-cent-per-pack increase in the federal cigarette tax to help fund the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP). This legislation has strong, bipartisan support in Congress and the overwhelming support of the American people because it will improve children’s health, reduce smoking and save lives. President Bush now faces a clear choice: Stand with America’s children by signing the bill or stand with Big Tobacco by vetoing it.
A higher cigarette tax is a win-win-win solution for the country – a health win that will reduce tobacco use and save lives, a financial win that will raise revenue to help fund the SCHIP program and reduce tobacco-caused health care costs, and a political win that is popular with voters. A recent poll conducted for the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids found that 67 percent of voters support a 75-cent per pack increase in the federal cigarette tax to provide health coverage to uninsured children, while only 28 percent oppose it.
Increasing the cigarette tax is a proven strategy to reduce smoking, especially among children. Studies show that every 10 percent increase in the price of cigarettes reduces youth smoking by 7 percent and overall cigarette consumption by about 4 percent. A 61-cent increase in the federal cigarette tax will prevent almost 1.9 million kids from becoming regular smokers, help almost 1.2 million adult smokers quit, prevent more than 900,000 smoking-caused deaths and produce $43.9 billion in long-term health care savings.
Tobacco use is the leading preventable cause of death in the United States, killing more than 400,000 people and costing more than $96 billion in health care bills each year. Currently, about 23 percent of high school students smoke and more than 1,000 kids become new regular smokers every day.
The national poll of 1,000 registered voters was conducted by the Mellman Group May 29- June 3, 2007 and has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points.