beaconchurches

VALLEY FORGE, PA ( ABNS 07/17/08 ) —Since 2002, Faith United Against Tobacco, a broad and diverse coalition of more than 20 national faith denominations and organizations, including American Baptists, Southern Baptists, United Methodists, Jews, Muslims and Sikhs, has been working to convince the United States Congress to pass life-saving legislation that would authorize regulation of tobacco products by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

Thanks in large part to the work of this faith community, our nation is now closer than ever to the FDA legislation becoming law. The regulation bills have passed House and Senate Committees and may come up for vote in the next few weeks.

National Ministries’ Office of Governmental Relations urges American Baptists to take action now about this issue: contact your senators and representative in the U.S. Congress and ask them to vote for H.R. 1108 and S. 625, the bills that will bring tobacco products within FDA regulation.

This important legislation will establish a comprehensive national tobacco policy and restrict tobacco advertising and promotion, especially to children, along with granting regulation oversight to the FDA. Also, the legislation will grant the FDA authority to require that tobacco companies disclose contents of tobacco products and reduce or remove harmful ingredients; stop tobacco companies from misleading the public about the health risks of their products; and require larger, more effective health warnings on tobacco packaging.

Curtis Ramsey-Lucas, National Ministries’ managing director of Resource Development, says, “Our nation’s leaders have a moral obligation to do all they can to protect Americans, particularly children, from tobacco addiction and the health consequences of smoking. This legislation would in no small measure move our nation forward in achieving this goal.”

Currently, tobacco—one of the most deadly products on the market—is not regulated, while other products, such as macaroni and cheese and lipstick, come under the scrutiny of the FDA.

Recently released by leading public health organizations, “Big Tobacco’s Guinea Pigs: How an Unregulated Industry Experiments on America’s Kids and Consumers” shows how tobacco manufacturers take advantage of their lack of regulation to find novel ways to entice new users. Tobacco products—once limited to cigarettes, cigars, pipe tobacco and chewing or spit tobacco—now come in more flavors, forms, shapes and sizes. The tobacco industry has introduced cigarettes, smokeless tobacco products and so-called “little cigars” in an array of candy, fruit and alcohol flavors that mask their harshness, making them more appealing to children. Colorful ads for these products appear in magazines with large youth readerships such as Rolling Stone and Sports Illustrated.

But the industry doesn’t stop at marketing products that are enticing to kids. Knowing that first-time users will find smoking unpleasant, manufacturers carefully add sugars and chemicals that numb the throat to make them less harsh. According to “Big Tobacco’s” own internal documents, these methods improve “mouth feel” by reducing negative sensations like hotness and dryness.

The faith community needs to take a strong stand about this issue because we spend so much time burying fathers, mothers, sisters and brothers who die terrible, unnecessary, deaths caused by addictions to tobacco. It is long past time for Congress to rectify this by giving the FDA the authority it needs to reduce smoking, particularly among children, and save thousands of lives from the horrors of tobacco addiction.

That’s why National Ministries recommends that American Baptists join the Campaign For Tobacco Free Kids, the American Cancer Society, the American Heart Association, the American Lung Association and other public health leaders in support of the FDA legislation.

As American Baptist Churches USA General Secretary Rev. Dr. Roy Medley, who has signed several letters about this issue to members of Congress, says, “No other issue has united faith leaders of all different political stripes like reducing smoking by authorizing the FDA to regulate tobacco products. We all know this is a moral issue whose time has come.”

Get more details about the pending FDA legislation at www.tobaccofreekids.org.