Cancer Fighters Travel to Sacramento to Make Cancer a Priority

(Sacramento, CA)– April 14, 2015 - Nearly 150 cancer patients, survivors and caregivers from across the state traveled to the Capitol to request support for a sweeping series of tobacco-related bills to keep youth from smoking, curb tobacco-related healthcare costs and fund tobacco prevention and cessation programs. The visit is part of the annual American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network (ACS CAN) Day at the Capitol. An estimated 30 percent of cancers are caused by tobacco, which kills a total of about 16,000 Californians annually.

“My mother was a smoker and I lost her to cancer. If we’re going to eliminate cancer as a major health problem in California, we must first get back to being a leader in the tobacco fight,” said ACS CAN State Lead Ambassador Kathy Flaherty. “Currently, there are 32 states with higher tobacco taxes than California. Even Texas has a higher tobacco tax than we do! To reduce suffering and death from this disease, we need to tackle tobacco issues including the alarming rise in ecigarette smoking, especially among young people where there is a three-fold increase as compared to a few years ago.”

Specifically, ACS CAN volunteers are meeting with their representatives tomorrow to advocate for the following tobacco-related bills.

• SB 591/AB 1396 are companion bills that would raise the tobacco tax by $2 per pack, with most of the money going into the state’s Medi-Cal program that incurs about $3.5 billion annually in direct tobacco-related healthcare expenses to taxpayers.
• SB140 would define ecigarettes as tobacco products so that the same laws that keep kids from buying tobacco products apply to ecigs.
• SB 151 would raise the minimum sales age for tobacco products from 18 to 21. If applied nationally, raising the sales age to 21 would cut smoking rates by 12 percent and smoking-related deaths by 10 percent.

Three state senators spoke at today’s event including Senator Ed Hernandez on his SB 151 that would limit sales of tobacco products to those 21 years of age and older. The senators armed ACS CAN volunteers with additional information shortly before the advocates headed out to meet with legislative members.

“The fastest growth segment in ecigarettes is middle and high school students who have never smoked a cigarette in their lives,” said Senator Mark Leno, author of SB 140. “We know where this is going, what it’s about—it’s about addicting more and more people to nicotine, yet again.”
“For every 10 percent increase in the price of cigarettes, youth smoking rates drop by 7 percent,” said Senator Richard Pan speaking on the $2 per pack tobacco tax bill he authored.

ACS CAN is the nonprofit, nonpartisan advocacy affiliate organization of the American Cancer Society, dedicated to eliminating cancer as a major health problem. ACS CAN works to encourage lawmakers, candidates and government officials to support laws and policies that will make cancer a top national priority. ACS CAN gives ordinary people extraordinary power to fight cancer. For more information, visit www.fightcancer.org.