Statement On The Human Rights Watch Report "Tobacco's Hidden Children: Hazardous Child Labor In U.S. Tobacco Farming"

NEW YORK, May 14, 2014 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- "The human rights watch report, "Tobacco's Hidden Children: Hazardous Child Labor in U.S. Tobacco Farming," reveals that the tobacco industry's exploitation of children extends well beyond its efforts to lure children to start smoking and hooking them on nicotine. This sickening report finds that the tobacco growing industry in the United States exploits children and teens in its tobacco fields, exposing them to nicotine poisoning from tobacco plants and working them for long hours under degrading conditions. Sadly, this report makes clear that if there's a way to exploit children, the tobacco industry will find it."

The Citizens' Commission to Protect the Truth, a group of all living former U.S. Secretaries of Health, Education, and Welfare; U.S. Secretaries of Health and Human Services; U.S. Surgeons General; and Directors of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention from every administration, Republican and Democrat, since that of President Lyndon B. Johnson, was formed in 2004. Among its efforts, the Commission shines a spotlight on the continued need to fund truth®, the independent national youth counter-marketing campaign mounted by Legacy®, and the only one with demonstrated results in keeping children and teens from smoking. For more information on the Commission, visit its website at www.ProtecttheTruth.org.

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SOURCE Citizens' Commission to Protect the Truth