Lancet
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The USA has a rich history of public health efforts to reduce morbidity and mortality from tobacco use. Comprehensive tobacco-prevention programmes, when robustly implemented, reduce the prevalence of youth and adult smoking, decrease cigarette consumption, accelerate declines in tobacco-related deaths, and diminish health-care costs from tobacco-related diseases. ⋯ The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has six major areas of regulatory authority: regulation of tobacco products; regulation of the advertising, marketing, and promotion of tobacco products; regulation of the distribution and sales of tobacco products; enforcement of the provisions of the Tobacco Control Act and tobacco regulations; regulatory science to support FDA authorities and activities; and public education about the harms of tobacco products and to support FDA regulatory actions. With passing of the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act (Tobacco Control Act) in June, 2009, important new regulatory approaches were added to the tobacco prevention and control arsenal.