TORONTO - The Canadian Cancer Society is calling for a government ban on flavoured cigarillos after a national youth smoking survey found a high proportion of teens have at least experimented with the product.
Cigarillos, or little cigars, are sold in flavours that mimic those of candy, fruit or ice cream - drawing in youngsters who might otherwise never try smoking, said Rob Cunningham, a senior policy analyst for the society.
"They come in very colourful packages and flavours that are very enticing to kids - vanilla, chocolate, strawberry, mint, peach, raspberry and so on," Cunningham said Monday.
"And it's a product category that's simply exploded on the market," he said, noting that Health Canada figures show that unit sales of cigarillos skyrocketed to more than 80 million units in 2006 from just 50,000 units five years earlier.
The 2006-2007 Youth Smoking Survey by the University of Waterloo, released Monday, found that 35 per cent of Grade 10 to 12 students reported having tried "cigars, cigarillos and little cigars."
The survey of 71,000 students in Grades 5 to 12 from across Canada found that 48 per cent had tried cigarettes.
Cigars and cigarillos are rolls of tobacco wrapped in tobacco leaf paper. Smoking cigars and cigarillos increases the risk of cancer of the mouth, throat, larynx, lungs and esophagus.
But Cunningham said cigarillos look anything but dangerous. They typically sport packaging that makes them look like crayons or a lipstick and are sold in small packs or individually, making them more affordable for young people than the cigarettes sold in minimum packs of 20.
Health warnings on cigarillos are much less prominent than those on cigarette packages and there are no health warnings at all on individually packaged cigarillos, he added.
"Our concern is that this cigarillo product category could become a starter product for those who would never begin smoking unless we shut down this opening before the problem becomes even more severe."
Steve Manske of the Centre for Behavioural Research and Program Evaluation at the University of Waterloo, who co-ordinated the Health Canada-sponsored survey, said the rate of tobacco use among Canadian youth had been steadily declining for years, but now seems to have flatlined.
That makes a possibly growing popularity of cigarillos among young Canadians of great concern, said Manske, because they appear to be easily obtained.
Despite legislation that curbs the sale of tobacco products to minors, Manske said more than one-third of Grade 10 to 12 students who reported trying cigarillos had purchased them from stores.
And the cost for a single cigarillo is affordable for most teens at about the same cost as a cup of coffee.
"If you're just going to a party and wanting to try one, then it's only a buck-fifty, or in that sort of range."
Manske said researchers don't know why the drop in youth smoking rates has stalled, but it's concerning because smoking puts kids at risk "for a lifetime of illness."
"There's something else in their environment that has likely changed. It's just we haven't nailed down exactly what that is."
