Drop in smoking rates is welcome news
Thursday, September 18, 2008 11:30 PM PDT
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E-mail this articleThe latest statewide survey on adult smoking rates is something to cheer about. Granted, the survey records only a slight decline in the number of smokers in the state, from 17 percent in 2006 to 16.5 percent in 2007. But the longer view of this smoking trend is impressive. Washington’s adult smoking rate declined about 25 percent between 2000 and 2007. Almost a quarter of a million fewer people in the state were smoking last year than in 2000. The smoking rate among young people has been cut in half since 2000.
The figures in this survey for Cowlitz County are not so encouraging, according to Daily News reporter Barbara LaBoe. While the county also experienced a slight decrease in adult smoking rates from 2006 to 2007, LaBoe reports that the county’s overall smoking rate for 2007 was 22.4 percent, well above the statewide rate. More troubling, the number of pregnant mothers in the county who smoke actually rose slightly, from 26.4 percent in 2006 to 27.5 percent in 2007. And that smoking rate among pregnant mothers of 27.5 percent well over twice the statewide rate of 10.3 percent, according to LaBoe’s report.
Gov. Chris Gregoire attributes the statewide decline in adult smoking rates, in large part, to Washington’s “commitment to tobacco prevention.” She’s right, no doubt. The state launched a fairly aggressive smoking-prevention effort in 2000, using money from a landmark 1998 lawsuit settlement with major tobacco companies that will give the state more than $4.5 billion over the next 20 years.
State lawmakers are investing around 5 percent of that money in anti-tobacco programs. It’s a significant amount, more than most of the other 45 states involved in the lawsuit are putting toward smoking prevention. Indeed, Washington’s investment is seventh highest among the 46 states that share in the tobacco settlement.
Yet, the state could do better. Washington’s investment of less than $30 million a year remains below the federal Centers for Disease Control’s recommended spending level of $7.47 per capita. And it pales beside the almost $185 million that tobacco companies spend each years to promote their deadly products.
The gains witnessed over the years confirm that these smoking-prevention dollars are being well spent. Washington’s annual tobacco-related death toll is around 7,500. About 45 young people in the state take up the tobacco habit each day. The public-health costs associated with this addiction are enormous. Washington taxpayers cough up more than $1.3 billion a year to treat tobacco-related diseases. The state’s smoking-prevention efforts are saving money and lives.
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