Since tobacco first washed up on England’s shores in the late 16th century, some Brits have been trying to kick it out. King James I, back in 1604, was so alarmed he slapped a 4,000 percent tariff on the stuff and penned an early anti-tobacco essay, calling smoking “lothsome to the eye, hatefull to the Nose, harmefull to the braine, dangerous to the Lungs.” Clearly, he was not a fan. Yet here we are, over 400 years later, and people in the U.K. still smoke. Now, a new law prohibits anyone born on or after January 1, 2009, from ever buying cigarettes. The goal: a tobacco-free generation. The reality: at least in the short term, that generation will likely still find a way to light up.

Generational tobacco bans were first floated in 2010 by researchers in Singapore. By then, less extreme measures - media campaigns, clean-air laws, taxes - had whittled smoking rates down enough that public-health advocates began dreaming of an “endgame.” Former U.K. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, when he proposed the plan in 2023, declared, “I want to stamp out smoking for good.” Currently, you need to be 18 to buy cigarettes. Starting January 1, 2027, an 18-year-old born on New Year’s Day 2009 will never legally buy a cigarette again - but a friend born one day earlier faces no such barrier. Critics point out that this essentially guarantees 18-year-olds will bum cigarettes from older pals, just as teens have done since time immemorial. Data show most adolescent British smokers get cigarettes for free from older acquaintances; one study found kids as young as 12 waiting outside tobacco shops, hoping someone under 25 would buy for them.

Lawmakers included language to discourage older folks from buying for younger ones, but the real fix is time. By 2034, no one under 25 will be able to purchase cigarettes, and the pool of illegal suppliers will shrink. Since peer smoking boosts initiation rates, fewer legal smokers should create a ripple effect, dissuading experimentation. By 2079, no one under 70 will legally be able to smoke - turning it from teenage rebellion into a retirement-home relic. That all hinges on retailers following the law, which is a big if. In a 2023 NHS survey, one-third of youth smokers reported regularly buying cigarettes from shops illegally. “I don’t think we should play down the need for enforcement,” Nathan Davies, a tobacco-control doctoral fellow at the University of Nottingham, told me. And even if shopkeepers comply, black markets could emerge, as in Bhutan, where a 2004 total sales ban led to easy access via dealers who served even young children; by 2019, nearly a quarter of 13-to-15-year-olds there used tobacco.

Nigel Farage, leader of the right-wing Reform U.K. Party, has warned of a similar black market. But the U.K. ban is structured to let current smokers keep buying legally, shrinking black-market profitability. “The Bhutan and U.K. policies are structurally so different in scope, sequencing, enforcement infrastructure, and market context that the comparison generates more confusion than insight,” Kashish Aneja of Georgetown University’s O’Neill Institute told me via email. No actual generational ban has existed long enough to show long-term effects. The Maldives implemented one in November. Several Massachusetts towns, starting with Brookline in 2021, have passed similar bans - so far with little effect, but advocates say real change takes time. “It is a slow and gentle policy change,” Mark Gottlieb of Northeastern University’s Public Health Advocacy Institute told me.

New Zealand’s Labour Party passed a tobacco-free-generation policy in 2022, but the incoming center-right coalition government repealed it in 2024 before it took effect, citing lost tax revenue and smuggling fears. Something similar could happen in the U.K., especially with Farage, a smoker, calling the ban “puritanical” and vowing repeal if his party gains power. Tobacco companies urged Parliament not to pass the law, arguing it’s discriminatory and would boost crime. Japan Tobacco International warned it would hand the market to organized criminals funding “terrorism, weapons trading, narcotics, and people smuggling.” The industry also courted U.K. conservatives with lunches and parties during the debate. Major British tobacco companies declined to say whether they want the ban repealed, emphasizing instead that they’ll work with the government on implementation. A recent modeling study led by Davies found the ban should drop smoking rates among under-30s below 5 percent by 2049 - giving cigarette makers decades to publicize middling results and any smuggling they uncover.

Some proponents have doubts. Ruth Malone, a UC San Francisco professor who helped articulate the tobacco endgame, suggests a “rapid ban” on cigarettes for all ages, plus restrictions on sales locations and flavored products. That would more quickly diminish industry profits and power. Despite the debate, generational bans are broadly popular: a poll by Action on Smoking and Health found 68 percent of English people support the new ban. In New Zealand, about 60 percent of voters opposed the repeal. Perhaps that’s because smoking remains a leading cause of preventable death, or because most smokers regret starting. The new policy might not help today’s teens much, but decades from now, a new generation might avoid that lifelong error - as long as the ban actually sticks around.