Menthol Smokes Banned, African-American Smokers

For African-Americans it’s a particularly harder feat. It’s hard to stop smoking. A study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that while 59 percent of Black smokers tried to quit, only 3.3 percent actually succeeded — the lowest success rate among all races and ethnicities. Those low rates may be explained by the fact that more than 80 percent of African-Americans smokers smoke menthols [PDF] — a minty tasting form of cigarettes that are harder to quit. Also, Big Tobacco spends millions on advertising these types of cigarettes specifically to our community.