A new study suggests it's marlboro cigarettes all too easy for minors to buy cigarettes online, because most vendors don't take steps to verify cheap cigarettes discount the age of buyers. Researchers from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill found that children were able to buy cigarettes online 92% of the times they tried.

"We were surprised at how easy it was," said lead author Kurt Ribisl, PhD, of the university's School of Public Health and Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center.

His findings were published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (Vol. 290, No. 10: 1356-1359). The study is the first to formally examine Internet cigarette sales to minors, though there have been anecdotal reports in the past of children being able to make such purchases buy cigarettes online cigarettes.

A Threat to Tobacco Control Efforts?

The study results trouble public health advocates, marlboro cigarettes who fear Internet tobacco sales could undermine efforts to reduce teen smoking – efforts like increasing tobacco taxes, limiting access to cigarette vending machines, and restricting tobacco sales to minors in retail stores cheap cigarettes.

Previous research suggests that only about 2% to 3% of teens buy cigarettes online, Ribisl said. But as communities more carefully control cigarette sales in stores, advocates worry that the number online buyers could grow dute free cigarettes.

"We feel it's a great time – before we see teens flocking to the Internet to buy cigarettes – to put legislation in place to block it," online cigarettes Ribisl said. There is currently no federal legislation banning tobacco sales to minors over the Internet, he noted. And while retail sales to minors are illegal in all 50 states, only a handful ban online sales to children cheap cigarettes discount cheap cigarettes.