US passes tobacco bill

US President Barack Obama has signed into law the recently debated tobacco bill.



Mr. Obama says the country’s strongest ever anti-smoking measure will save lives.



Obama added that despite decades of lobbying and advertising by the tobacco industry, the new law is necessary to protect the next generation of Americans from growing up with a deadly habit.



The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) now has new powers to regulate the content and marketing of tobacco products.



The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that FDA regulation could reduce underage smoking by 11 per cent over the next decade, and adult smoking by two per cent.



Currently about one in five Americans smoke and some 440,000 die each year of smoking-related illnesses.