LOS ANGELES -- Illegal sales of cigarettes to minors has increased for the first time in three years across California, and the use of smokeless tobacco products such as snus is rising among youth, according to a first-of-its-kind report released by state public health officials on Thursday.
This year alone, illegal tobacco sales to minors rose to 8.7 percent of that group from 5.6 percent in 2011. Many of those sales come from nontraditional stores such as doughnut shops, discount stores, deli, meat or produce markets, health officials said during a news conference.
Smoking may be down across California, but sales of all tobacco and nicotine products have risen over the last decade.
Sales of smokeless products such as chewing tobacco, grew in California from $77.1 million in 2001 to $210.9 million in 2011, officials said. There are 36,700 licensed tobacco retail stores in California.
"We felt there was new, concerning information that we wanted to put out to the public," said Dr. Ron Chapman, state health director who said the report was the first of its kind to be produced by his department.
Chapman said while the good news was that fewer teenagers smoke in California than almost anywhere else in the country, the use of smokeless tobacco such as snus rose from 3.1 percent of teens in 2004 to 3.9 percent in 2010.
Snus is a moist powder that is placed under the lip.
"Snus is particularly worrisome," Chapman said. "The tobacco industry has promoted snus as a way to get around policies and laws that prohibit smoking."
Colleen Stevens, branch chief of the state's tobacco control program, said other products are emerging as well such as orbs, which look like Tic Tacs, and tobacco strips, that look similar to breath strips.
"Some of these products are flying under the radar," Stevens said. "People can use it at the work site."
Stevens said orbs and strips are so new and still found mostly in other states, that the health effects are unclear. But because they contain nicotine, one factor is certain: "These keep a lot of people addicted," Stevens said.
Chapman also said he was still concerned with the increase of smokers between the ages of 18 to 24, a time when young people leave smoke-free families and homes, and begin to experiment.
The report also found: Since the beginning of the California Tobacco Control Program, the adult smoking rate has decreased from 23 percent in 1988 to 12 percent in 2011.
The popularity of hookah smoking has increased among young adults, exposing them to both tobacco use and secondhand smoke. Smoking a hookah for 45 to 60 minutes can be equivalent to smoking 100 or more cigarettes, health officials said.
There are some 3.6 million smokers in the state. In Los Angeles County, fewer than a million adults are smokers, a figure reached for the first time since such data were collected in 1997, according to a separate health report released last month.
But no data yet exists on how Los Angeles residents use smokeless tobacco products, county officials said.
"We've done very well, but these other (smokeless) tobacco products concern us," said Dr. Paul Simon, director of chronic diseases and injury prevention for the county's department of public health. "These products can potentially promote nicotine addiction, and become a gateway to smoking cigarettes."
But health officials say they must work harder to target groups where smoking remains prevalent such as among African-American youth, and within the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender community.
Chapman said the department will unveil new advertisements next month in Spanish.
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