100 Advocacy Groups Ask The UN to Look at The Effects of Menthol Cigarettes on African Americans Health

Almost a hundred advocacy organizations have petitioned the United Nations to investigate the negative effects of menthol cigarettes on African Americans’ health as a human-rights problem, increasing pressure on the US government to outlaw the minty flavored tobacco products.

Bloomberg News obtained a copy of the request to the United Nations Human Rights Council, which is addressed to a committee working to end racial discrimination. The groups want the committee to push for a ban on menthol cigarettes in the United States.

The African American Tobacco Control Leadership Council and Action on Smoking and Health are among the initiative’s founders. The American Heart Association, the National Council of Churches, and the International Union Against Tuberculosis and Lung Disease are among the 92 organizations that have signed up.

The groups said in the letter, “The decades of well-documented racialized and predatory tobacco industry targeting of African Americans, specifically with menthol flavoring, is a human rights issue.”

Tobacco consumers are now looking for stricter controls in the United States: On April 19, stocks plummeted in response to news that the US Food and Drug Administration is considering banning menthol and putting a limit on nicotine levels in cigarettes. Menthols are especially dangerous because their minty taste can make the habit more attractive to some people.

With increased concerns about smoking during the Covid-19 respiratory pandemic, especially among African Americans, controversy over the agency’s failure to enforce tobacco restrictions, after talking about them for years, has grown. The marketing of menthols to African Americans has been a source of contention for decades.

In the complaint filed by the African American Tobacco Control Leadership Council or AATCLC, the FDA is scheduled to issue a statement on menthol cigarettes by April 29. Despite legislative pressure in 2009, the FDA failed to control menthol, according to the organization.

According to the letter from AATCLC and Action on Smoking and Health, the African-American population was projected to experience 4,700 excess deaths linked to menthol cigarettes by 2020 if the FDA did not act on menthol in 2011.

Kelsey Romeo-Stuppy, managing attorney with Action on Smoking and Health, said in a phone interview, “Menthol is a health and equality issue, and while we’re talking about equality around Covid, now is the time to be talking about menthol.”

ASH also intends to send a separate letter to the US State Department, stating that the government has a responsibility to report to the UN on its success in eliminating racial discrimination. According to the letter, which Bloomberg News also checked, the department was expected to send a letter in 2017 but never did. According to the community, the delay is especially concerning when Covid-19 is exacerbating health disparities.

Although UN pressure to ban menthols might be a long shot, the international organization has previously responded to similar requests. Argentina should take steps to reform how cigarettes are sold to women in the region, according to the UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women.

Menthol-flavored cigarettes have been outlawed by the European Union and countries such as Brazil, Canada, Ethiopia, and Moldova.

Michael R. Bloomberg has campaigned and contributed to a tobacco and flavored e-cigarette ban. Bloomberg LP, the parent company of Bloomberg News, is majority-owned by him.