It is a huge disappointment that legislation proposed to raise the legal age to buy tobacco to 21 failed.

The bill, requested by Attorney General Bob Ferguson, would raise the legal age to buy tobacco from 18 to 21. However, House Bill 1458 did not make it through a committee hearing that reduced the proposed upper age limit of 21 for buying tobacco products to 19.

The original proposal was essentially rendered useless.

The new law, sponsored by Sen. Mark Miloscia (R-Federal Way) and Rep. Tina Orwall (D-Des Moines), would apply to tobacco and other nicotine products, including “vaping.”

A mountain of research, including a recent report from the Institute of Medicine, indicates that increasing the smoking age to 21 would significantly reduce the number of young people who start smoking; reduce deaths from smoking; and immediately improve the health of adolescents, young adults, and those around them.

So why is this so hard? Late adolescence and young adulthood is the time that smoking begins. We should be pushing any way possible to stem the tide of new smokers.

Research from the Centers for Disease Control indicates that each day in the United States, more than 3,200 people younger than 18 years of age smoke their first cigarette, and an estimated 2,100 youth and young adults who have been occasional smokers become daily cigarette smokers.

More young men begin smoking than young women. But a newer trend has emerged with both young men and women using a variety of tobacco-type products.

Smoking is expensive and gross. The effects of smoking not only kills smokers but can harm those around them.  We all end up paying the price.