Town Halls to Focus on Tobacco Use

The Tobacco Free Living Action Team of the Healthy St. Mary’s Partnership, supported by MedStar St. Mary’s Hospital, is facilitating a two-part Town Hall Series to discuss the issue of underage tobacco and e-cigarette use. The first event in February focused on underage tobacco use. The second event will be held from 6:30 to 7:30 pm April 21, 2016, at the Lexington Park Library Meeting Room A at 21677 FDR Blvd. in Lexington Park. It will focus on e-cigarette use.

The use of tobacco is the leading preventable cause of death and disease in the US. Selling tobacco products to young people younger than 18 is illegal, yet nearly nine of 10 smokers started smoking by the age of 18 and about 19 percent of St. Mary’s County high school students use tobacco. This statistic is higher than state and national averages. These open community conversations are designed to talk about underage tobacco and e-cigarette use in St. Mary’s County.

For more information on the TFL Action Team, visit their website.

The special guest speaker for the town hall events will be William Tilburg, JD, deputy director of the resource center for public health policy based at the University of Maryland Carey School of Law. Mr. Tilburg has written legal synopses on local efforts and authority to restrict the sale of tobacco products and regulating tobacco products based on pack size for the Tobacco Control Legal Consortium. He has filed petitions and public comments to the Food and Drug Administration asking that the agency regulate cigars and other non-cigarette tobacco products and reject tobacco manufacturer applications seeking designation as modified risk tobacco products.

For more information about the town hall events, call 301-475-4391.

For more information and one-click access to a full list of resources available at MedStar St. Mary’s Hospital, visit their Leader Page.