Petitions Seeking Tobacco Regulation Delivered to FDA

On January 11, 7th-grade students representing the 2 million members of the Smoke-Free Class of 2000, delivered petitions to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and congressional leaders, urging them for FDA regulation of tobacco. The petition drive, which began in early October, resulted in a quarter million plus signatures.

APA is one of the more than 80 national health, medical, consumer, and religious organizations that sponsored the petition drive as part of the 'Coalition to Protect Our Children From Tobacco.' The campaign goal is to protect the public's health and ensure that children are not encouraged to smoke or given access to tobacco products. The coalition believes that the manufacturers of tobacco products should have to comply with sensible regulations about the way their products are manufactured, sold, labeled, advertised, and promoted--as do manufacturers of other products.

Former President Jimmy Carter and former U.S. Surgeon General C. Everett Koop, MD, serve as honorary cochairmen of the effort. Notably, the petition is supported by 13 former U.S. Secretaries and Assistant Secretaries of Health and former U.S. Surgeon Generals representing both Republican and Democratic presidential administrations, including those of Reagan, Bush, Nixon, and Carter. According to the Coalition on Smoking OR Health, an antismoking advocacy group, 'the signatures represent the first installment from a national public petition drive supporting FDA jurisdiction over tobacco.'

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