The amount of money tobacco companies have spent for youth-oriented advertising rose slightly between 1995 and 2000, reported researchers in the Aug. 16 issue of The New England Journal of Medicine.
Youth-oriented tobacco ads increased despite the 1998 Master Settlement Agreement between 46 states and the four largest tobacco companies researchers noted. The agreement prohibits tobacco advertising that targets people younger than 18 years.
Boston-area researchers analyzed trends for 1995 through 2000 in the amount of money spent for advertising 15 brands of cigarettes and the exposure of young people to cigarette advertising in 38 magazines targeted to both adults and adolescents.
Researchers found that cigarette advertising expenditures increased slightly between 1995 and 2000. In 1995, 24 percent of the tobacco companies’ advertising budgets was allocated to youth-oriented advertising, while 28 percent was set aside in 2000.
They also found that magazine advertisements for youth brands of cigarettes reached more than 80 percent of young people in the United States an average of 17 times in 2000.
Researchers concluded that the Master Settlement Agreement appears to have had little effect on cigarette advertising in magazines and on young people’s exposure to these advertisements.
