LATEST ALERTS
2nd December 2024
- US - Massachusetts: Three state senators have announced their intention to file a new bill in the 2025-26 legislative session to generationally phase out the legal sale of all tobacco and nicotine products in the state. This would replace the current age-based eligibility system with a requirement to be born before a specific date. Massachusetts won’t be the first state to have generational tobacco ban legislation introduced, but it could be the first one to see it pass. In March, the Massachusetts Supreme Court upheld a “tobacco-free generation” law passed in 2020 by the city of Brookline that bans the sale of vaping and tobacco products in Brookline to anyone born on or after 1st January 2000.
25th November 2024
- US - Massachusetts: The Northampton Board of Health has approved a proposal banning the sale of nicotine pouches in convenience stores, according to local news. Starting 1st January 2025, nicotine pouches will only be able to be sold in adult-only stores. Northampton is a city with a population of around 29,000, and is the county seat of Hampshire County, which has a population of around 162,000. Whether this measure will extend to other localities remains to be seen.
13th August 2024
- US - Massachusetts: The Attorney General’s Office (AGO) has reached a $600m settlement with major tobacco manufacturers. According to a statement by attorney general Andrea Joy Campbell, certain manufacturers withheld funds due as part of the 1988 Master Settlement Agreement (MSA) in which they agreed to pay states billions of dollars each year to offset medical expenses caused by smoking. With this latest settlement, seven of these disputes have now been resolved. “The country’s major tobacco manufacturers have pushed smoking products to young people for decades – and this settlement is evidence of our ongoing commitment to hold these companies accountable for their actions that caused irreparable harm to public health and safety,” said the attorney general. Governor Maura Healey praised the “historic” settlement and said “Big Tobacco used harmful and misleading marketing practices for decades and undermined public health”.
22nd May 2024
- US - Massachusetts: The New England Convenience Store & Energy Marketers Association (NECSEMA) has launched the “Citizens for Adult Choice” campaign, in order to protect individual liberties from the risks from “creeping authoritarianism of local authorities who seek to dictate their personal preferences onto other adults”. This refers to the nicotine/tobacco generational bans, which the campaign defines as “establishing an arbitrary 'born on date' whereby anyone born after is prohibited from using any nicotine product at any age or for any reason where a person is 21, 30, or 50+”.
12th March 2024
- US - Massachusetts: The Massachusetts Supreme Court has upheld a “tobacco-free generation” law passed in 2020 by the town of Brookline that bans the sale of vaping and tobacco products in Brookline to anyone born on or after 1st January 2000. The court rejected the argument that the ban conflicts with existing state laws that set the legal age to buy tobacco and vaping products at 21. State law allows local municipalities to completely ban tobacco sales if they so choose, said the court: “Because the bylaw falls within the type of local law limiting or prohibiting the sale of tobacco products expressly permitted by the act, and because the bylaw is not otherwise inconsistent, contrary, or conflicting with the act’s minimum age standard, we conclude that it is not preempted”.
2nd November 2022
Massachusetts: The Massachusetts Superior Court has dismissed a challenge to the town of Brookline’s Tobacco-Free Generation bylaw, which will remain in effect, town administrator Chas Carey has announced. The bylaw prohibits anyone born after 1st January 2000 from purchasing tobacco products, including e-cigarettes, in the town. “The dismissal of this challenge is a positive outcome, validating decades of tobacco control work in local government to reduce access to tobacco and nicotine products and prevent disease for future generations,” the town’s public health commissioner Sigalle Reiss said. “Brookline has laid the path that other communities may now follow as they seek to keep harmful tobacco products out of the hands of generations to come.” Brookline, which lies in the Boston metropolitan area, has a population of around 60,000.
19th October 2022
US - Massachusetts: The Massachusetts Superior Court has dismissed a lawsuit challenging a local by-law banning the sale of tobacco products in the town of Brookline to anyone born after 1st January 2000. The court saw no conflict between the town law and state law, which specifically allows cities and towns to restrict the sale of tobacco products.
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