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CDC Releases Two State-Specific Tobacco Reports
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) today released two
state-specific reports on tobacco use, one highlighting the severity of the
public health problem and the other presenting a science-based blueprint for
solving it.
The first report, State Tobacco Control Highlights, 1999, summarizes
information on tobacco use in all 50 states and the District of Columbia. It is
an update of a publication first released in 1996 and presents current
state-based information on the prevalence of tobacco use, tobacco control laws,
the health impact and costs associated with tobacco use, and tobacco agriculture
and manufacturing. The report shows
- State-specific smoking prevalence among adults varies more than twofold,
ranging from a low of 13.7 percent in Utah to a high of 30.8 percent in
Kentucky.
- Current smoking among young people (grades 9-12) ranges from 16.4 percent
in Utah to 47.0 percent in Kentucky, more than a threefold difference.
- Among states with laws that restrict smoking in private worksites, only
California meets the nation’s Healthy People 2000 objective to eliminate
nonsmokers’ exposure to environmental tobacco smoke.
- State excise taxes on cigarettes range from a low of 2.5 cents per pack
in Virginia to a high of $1.00 per pack in Alaska and Hawaii.
"This report is extremely useful because it allows public health workers
and policy-makers at the state level to compare their data with that of other
states using comparable measures," said CDC Director Dr. Jeffrey Koplan.
"These data provide the most current evidence that tobacco use places a
tremendous health and economic burden on every state in the nation."
The second report, Best Practices for
Comprehensive Tobacco Control Programs, provides states with
recommended strategies and funding levels for effective programs to prevent and
reduce tobacco use, eliminate the public’s exposure to secondhand smoke, and
identify and eliminate disparities related to tobacco use and its effects among
different population groups. CDC provided a draft version of the report to the
states in 1998 to help guide their decisions about the use of funds from last
year’s master settlement agreement with the tobacco industry.
The Best Practices guidelines address nine components of comprehensive
tobacco control programs: community programs, chronic disease programs (e.g.,
heart disease prevention, cancer registries) to reduce the burden of
tobacco-related diseases, school programs, enforcement, statewide programs,
counter-marketing, cessation programs, surveillance and evaluation, and
administration and management. For each component, CDC presents a range of
funding levels for each state to consider based on needs and priorities in that
particular state.
CDC estimates that the annual costs to implement all of the recommended
program components range from $7 to $20 per capita in small states to $5 to $16
per capita in large states. For the average state, total recommended program
costs would range between $31 million (lower estimate) and $83 million (upper
estimate) each year.
"Considering that the states will receive a combined amount of nearly
$41 billion over the next five years from their settlements with the tobacco
industry, the mid-range of our funding estimates ($14.5 billion) would account
for about a third of the resources currently available to states," said Dr.
Koplan. "The sad fact remains, however, that most states have not earmarked
significant settlement funds for tobacco control, and no state is currently
implementing all of the recommended program components fully."
Dr. Michael Eriksen, director of CDC’s Office on Smoking and Health (OSH),
said that State Tobacco Control Highlights and Best Practices for
Comprehensive Tobacco Control Programs present the two sides of the tobacco
control story. "The bad news is that tobacco use continues to be the
leading preventable cause of death in our country. The good news is that we
clearly know what effective prevention programs should look like. So now our
challenge is to translate this knowledge into action for the health of the
citizens of every state," Dr. Eriksen said.
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