Group seeks cigarette tax hike

BANGOR – A coalition of health advocacy organizations Thursday asked the state to increase cigarette taxes by 50 cents per pack in an effort to curb smoking. That would bring taxes on a pack of cigarettes to $1.24.

Members of the Alliance for a Healthy New England held press conferences across the region recommending the increase in each state.

In Bangor, a doctor, a consumer advocate and two high school students spoke at a press conference at Beal College. They said increasing the price of a pack of cigarettes would discourage more Mainers from the unhealthy habit.

“This year alone the cigarette companies will sell about 105 million packs of cigarettes in Maine,” said Dr. Edward M. Harrow, a Bangor pulmonologist speaking for the Maine Medical Association. “By implementing a 50-cent per pack hike in tobacco excise taxes, Maine can reduce adult smoking by 2.5 percent, teen smoking by 6.4 percent and smoking by pregnant women by 6.4 percent.”

According to state reports, since the excise tax on cigarettes was increased from 37 cents to 74 cents a pack in 1997, the consumption of cigarettes among all age groups has dropped 17 percent.

But tobacco remains one of the leading causes of preventable diseases. Maine has the highest rate of young adult smokers in the nation. Thirty-seven percent of all 18- to 24-year-olds smoke, as do 44 percent of men aged 18 to 30.

High smoking rates don’t surprise Leah Wade, a 15-year-old from Erskine Academy in China, who was one of those testifying for the tax hike. She said that only three of her 30 to 40 friends don’t smoke. Even those she thought were resistant to smoking “bend to peer pressure and begin smoking.”

Wade and classmate Nicole Hunt said Erskine Academy students smoke in their cars during school breaks. And they get cigarettes easily from parents and friends over 18, they said.

The Alliance for a Healthy New England hopes a regionwide tax hike would reduce the opportunity for cross-state border smuggling of cigarettes. The proceeds of the tax would be used to fund programs to help the uninsured and underinsured get health care services.

In Maine the tax would generate about $47.5 million a year for five years, according to Dan Shagourney, acting chairman of Citizens for Affordable Health Care, a member of the alliance. “That revenue will go a long way to helping us reduce some of the 161,000 uninsured Maine citizens who cannot effort coverage,” he said.

Shagourney said he expects tobacco companies and others who support smoker’s rights will fight the proposal. He said he was uncertain how much support the proposal would garner, in part because of the huge number of unknown freshman legislators who will be going to Augusta for the upcoming legislative session.

He said the coalition would make strong arguments for the tax. For instance, an opinion survey of 423 Maine voters in August by the University of New Hampshire Survey Center showed 78 percent favored using cigarette tax revenues to help the uninsured.

Gov. Angus King will consider the tax, said spokesman John Ripley Thursday.

“The Governor is certainly sympathetic to this idea and believes that anything that will help to get Mainers to stop smoking is always a subject worth considering.”

Ripley noted that the high smoking rates have contributed to the State’s increased costs in the Medicaid program.