A letter to the editor in the August 23, 1997 issue of the British Medical Journal reports that "test sales" aimed at trapping merchants who sell cigarettes to minors have practically no effect on the prevalence of underage smoking. Called "sting operations" in the United States, "test sales" involve sending adolescents into shops to buy cigarettes while an adult official watches covertly. If cigarettes are sold to the minor, the shop is prosecuted.
The authors, Mark Bagott, Christine Jordan, Charlotte Wright, and Steve Court, of the department of Community Child Health at the University of Newcastle, surveyed 14-15-year-old boys and girls in two schools in Gateshead, UK, before and after the sting operations were instituted (1995 and 1996 respectively). One school had a high prevalence of smoking (39 percent of girls and 26 percent of boys) and the other school had a much lower prevalence (24 percent of girls and 14 percent of boys). The investigators also conducted focus groups with students to examine the availability of cigarettes in more detail.
The authors found that between 1995, when the stings began, and 1996, when the students were resurveyed, there was very little change in the prevalence of smoking in the two schools. Only 2.5 percent of adolescent smokers in 1995 and 6 percent in 1996 reported ever having had someone refuse to sell them cigarettes, and 95 percent of those who were regular smokers were still buying cigarettes from shops at least weekly in 1996. Meanwhile, the number of successful "stings" had declined to zero, suggesting (to sting enthusiasts, anyway) that the method had been successful in reducing teenage smoking. In reality the kids just kept looking until they found shops that would sell them cigarettes.
The authors conclude:
[T]his study suggests that test sales may not be a useful measure of the availability of cigarettes to children. A problem with this type of enforcement work is that a proxy outcome is being measured. Our work suggests that the number of successful test sales does not have an impact on access to cigarettes by young people or on the prevalence of smoking. Until such evidence is available it is hard to justify continuing with test sales.Pete Petrakis has a PhD in biochemistry from the University of California at San Francisco and an MPH in epidemiology from the University of California at Berkely School of Public Health. Dr. Petrakis writes 150-200 abstracts per month for the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism.
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