Should kids be banned from buying cigarettes until they're 21?

When kids are looking to get their hands on cigarettes, they often go to slightly older friends or relatives.

But a statewide push to raise the minimum age from 18 to 21 to buy tobacco and vape products aims to shut down that pipeline.

And it could soon be successful, the state Secretary of Health said Thursday on a visit to the Tri-Cities.

"We've been seeing progress every year," John Wiesman said of the effort.

"This is about keeping tobacco out of the hands of 14-, 15-, 16-, 17-year-olds, and preventing another generation from becoming addicted to nicotine," he told the Herald. "That’s really the goal here."

Raising the smoking age is one of Wiesman's top priorities, along with ending the opioid and AIDS epidemics in the state and transforming Washington's public health system. He discussed all those topics during an interview with the Herald.

Tobacco legislation passed the state House during the last session, and Wiesman is hopeful it'll gain more traction next session.

Raising the minimum age has been an effective tool in reducing teen tobacco use, he said. He pointed to the community of Needham, Mass., near Boston, which saw a steep drop in youth smoking after such a change.

"This is about protecting our kids from a very addictive substance," said Wiesman. "We think this is an important policy to pass."

Critics argue the change would mean lost tax revenue and infringe on the rights of adults old enough to go to war.

During his local stop, Wiesman also said progress is being made on the opioid epidemic in Washington.

Work has included changing rules so prescribing is done more safely and responsibly, increasing medication-assisted treatment options and making Naloxone — which can reverse opioid overdoses — more widely available.

Wiesman pointed to the new syringe exchange in Pasco as a local initiative that can make a difference.

"It’s a long-term effort that we’re in (to quell the epidemic), but the plans that we’re putting in place do seem to be working," Wiesman said, noting that Washington has seen a drop in opioid overdose deaths.

About two people die each day in Washington of opioid overdoses, he said.

Wiesman also highlighted an initiative to rebuild, modernize and fund the state's public health system.

Officials have identified the core public health services that should be available everywhere in the state and are working with lawmakers and others on how to fund them, Wiesman said. The price tag is about $350 million a year.

"But I think the issue is, you either pay now or you pay later when the system fails — when we're not stopping disease outbreaks, when we don't have the ability to respond to the opioid crisis" and so on, Wiesman said, adding that the state's public health system is "undergoing a severe malnourishment of funding that’s been lost over the last decade."

Wiesman also spoke about his priority of ending the AIDS epidemic in the state.

A coalition is working to reduce the number of new infections in the state by half by 2020.

This story was originally published May 10, 2018 at 5:06 PM with the headline "Should kids be banned from buying cigarettes until they're 21?."