Friday, December 16, 2022

Good on New Zealand

This seems like a pretty innovative way to stop people smoking. I hope it works!

New Zealand has passed into law a unique plan to phase out tobacco smoking for the next generation by imposing a lifetime ban on young people buying cigarettes.

The law states that tobacco can't ever be sold to anybody born on or after January 1, 2009 - and from now on, the minimum age for buying cigarettes will keep going up and up. 

In theory, somebody trying to buy a pack of cigarettes 50 years from now would need ID to show they were at least 63 years old. But health authorities hope smoking will fade away well before then. They have a stated goal of making New Zealand smoke-free by 2025."