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Bill de Blasio, the current mayor of New York City is almost all set to use the power of government legislation and taxation to give a hike in cigarette rates from $10.50 to $13. While raising the minimum price of a cigarette pack to $13 from the present $10.50 minimum, New York will be the most expensive place in the entire nation to purchase cigarettes, as confirmed by city officials.

Top 5 Causes Of Death Revealed By Bill De Blasio

The 109th mayor of New York, Bill De Blasio said that the city residents are having top 5 cause of death: respiratory disease, heart disease, pneumonia, cancer, and stroke – and these diseases are linked to smoking. A report released by the Department of Health claims that an average figure of 9,00,000 city adults smoke along with roughly 15,000 high school students.

“How supremely addictive this chemical is and what it does to people – we have to treat it aggressively,” Bill de Blasio opined at a conference recently, as reported by Reason.com.

This new step taken by de Blasio ensures that making cigarettes more costly does not treat anyone’s addiction and dependency on it, rather it ensures addiction is more costlier to sustain. On the other hand, this sort of effort is adequate in driving cigarette market underground for having the most lucrative cigarette black market in the country.

Bill de Blasio Blames E-Cigarette As The Gateway To Tobacco

De Blasio further emphasized on the issue by saying that the speed with which the e-cigarette has grown over the years is a part of the issue. According to him, some studies have also established the fact that e-cigarette is the entry point to the use of tobacco but defenders like manufacturers and retailers of e-cigarettes simply try to prove them as a safe alternative.

According to Heatstreet, Bill de Blasio is giving all his efforts to measure to cap the number of licenses issued to the cigarette retail sellers in the city. The city’s health commissioner has estimated that presently 9,000 retailers have the license to sell tobacco and the mayor wants the number to fall to at least 3,000 over a period of 10 years.