Today, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Office on Smoking and Health (OSH) released a tobacco-related article in the journal Preventing Chronic Disease entitled, “Stuck in Neutral: Stalled Progress in Statewide Comprehensive Smoke-Free Laws and Cigarette Excise Taxes, United States, 2000–2014.»

Authors examined state laws related to smoke-free buildings and to cigarette excise taxes from 2000 through 2014 to see how implementation of these laws from 2000 through 2009 differs from implementation in more recent years (2010–2014). The paper concludes that the recent stall in progress in enacting and implementing statewide comprehensive smoke-free laws and increasing cigarette excise taxes may undermine tobacco prevention and control efforts in the United States, undercutting efforts to reduce tobacco use, exposure to secondhand smoke, health disparities, and tobacco-related illness and death.