MN uses only 3% of tobacco dollars for prevention
[MMA News Now, December 1, 2011] The state of Minnesota is spending just 3 cents of every tobacco settlement and tax dollar it will collect this year to fight tobacco use. Such is the misuse of tobacco-generated funds nationally that even this low level of investment ranks Minnesota 10th in the nation in funding programs to prevent kids from smoking and help smokers quit.
MMA policy supports the use of settlement funds only for health care programs.
“At a time when tobacco use is still the number one preventable cause of death and disease in the U.S., it is shameful that Minnesota is only spending about three cents of every tobacco revenue dollar to fight tobacco use,” said MMA President Lyle Swenson, M.D.
Minnesota currently spends $19.5 million a year on tobacco prevention and cessation programs, which is 33.4 percent of the $58.4 million recommended by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), according to the annual report on states' funding of tobacco prevention programs, titled "A Broken Promise to Our Children: The 1998 State Tobacco Settlement 13 Years Later."
The study reported that Minnesota this year will collect $633 million in revenue from the 1998 tobacco settlement and tobacco taxes, but will spend just 3.1 percent of it on tobacco prevention programs. The report was released by the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, American Heart Association, American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network, American Lung Association, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and Americans for Nonsmokers' Rights.
Minnesota sold $757 million in tobacco revenue bonds on November 30 to help fix the state’s $5 billion budget deficit. Democratic legislative leaders worry that it will lead to a pattern of borrowing to finance the general fund and are urging lawmakers to end the practice of using appropriation bonds to solve state budget deficits.
Physicians worry about the medical implications. In Minnesota, 19.1 percent of high school students smoke, and 6,800 more kids become regular smokers each year. Tobacco annually claims 5,500 lives and costs the state $2.06 billion in health care bills.
Nationally, states will collect $25.6 billion in revenue from the state tobacco settlement and tobacco taxes in 2012, but will only spend 1.8 percent of this on programs to prevent kids from smoking and to help smokers quit.
Tobacco companies spend nearly $23 to market tobacco products for every $1 the states spend to fight tobacco use.
The AMA has urged physicians and state medical societies to take an active role in educating state elected officials on the importance of funding tobacco prevention and treatment programs, especially to help ease the economic burden for the treatment of tobacco-related diseases.
“This report serves as a wake up call to state legislators that tobacco prevention and treatment programs must be adequately funded if we want to eliminate the health, social, and economic consequences associated with tobacco use,” said AMA President Peter Carmel, M.D.
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