CDC: Cigarette Consumption Overtaken by Products like Cigar and Pipes

A new study "Consumption of Cigarettes and Combustible Tobacco--United States, 2000-2011" released by the Centre for Disease Control and Prevention declares how the adult consumption of pipe tobacco and cigarettes like cigar jumped drastically since 2008 with a simultaneous decline in cigarette consumption.

The year 2010-2011 noticed a downward trend in total cigarette consumption with a drop of 2.5 percent decline.  Dramatic increases in use of non-cigarette smoked tobacco products have slowed the long decline in overall consumption of smoked tobacco products.

Tobacco use remains the leading cause of preventable death and disease in the United States. Cigarette use and exposure to secondhand tobacco smoke kill an estimated 443,000 Americans each year. And for every death, 20 people live with a smoking-related disease.

From 2000 to 2011, the largest increases were in consumption of pipe tobacco (482 percent) and large cigars (233 percent). The increase in cigars was due largely to tobacco manufacturers adding weight to many small cigars so they can be classified as large cigars and avoid higher taxes and regulation, while at the same time retaining a size and shape very similar to cigarettes.

The statistics presented by the studies claim the total consumption of all smoked tobacco products that includes cigarettes, roll-your-own tobacco, pipe tobacco and cigars, declined by 27.5 percent between 2000 and 2011. However, decline was minimal (0.8 percent) between 2010 and 2011. Despite the overall decline, the consumption of non-cigarette smoked tobacco products increased by 123 percent.

"The rise in cigar smoking, which other studies show is a growing problem among youth and young adults, is cause for alarm," said Tim McAfee, director of CDC's Office on Smoking and Health. "The Surgeon General's Report released this past March shows that getting young people to either quit smoking or never start smoking is the key to ending the tobacco epidemic, because 99 percent of all smokers start before they're 26 years old."

This study was published in the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly report collected Treasure Department data to calculate consumption for all forms of smoked tobacco products.

The reason stated by the CDC for such a great disparity between consumption of cigarettes and other forms of smoked tobacco is the federal excise tax on pipe tobacco and roll-your-own tobacco is lower than cigarettes.

This directly led to the difference in the sale of pipe tobacco a lower-priced alternative to manufactured cigarettes.

The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Administration also released a report today, which shows that all the states and the District of Columbia have continued to meet their goals of curtailing sales of tobacco to underage youth (those under 18). To further reduce tobacco use among youth and young adults, the 2012 Surgeon General's Report recommends making tobacco products less affordable, running hard-hitting mass media campaigns, and adequately funding evidence-based tobacco control and prevention programs.