State Breaks Deal to Cut Smoking

When Virginia and a number of other states reached a legal settlement with the cigarette industry more than a decade ago, part of the deal was at least to put some of that money into tobacco-prevention programs. Those programs included efforts to expose young people — and adults — to the health hazards of smoking and using other tobacco products.

Virginia, in fact, has a statewide youth tobacco-prevention program managed by a foundation that received a portion of the state’s share of the 1998 national tobacco settlement.

But Virginia and five other states are regressing on their commitment to tobacco prevention programs and policies. In its annual State of Tobacco Control report released last week, the American Lung Association gave Virginia and five other states failing grades for tobacco-prevention funding, low cigarette taxes, public smoking laws and health coverage for tobacco cessation programs.

Most states, apparently, have decided that tobacco prevention is simply not a high priority any more. Thomas A. Carr, the American Lung Association’s director of national policy, said that “most states failed miserably to protect citizens from tobacco-related diseases in 2011.”

The report, according to a story by Media General News Service, criticized Virginia for having the nation’s second-lowest state cigarette tax at 30 cents per pack and for cutting funding for tobacco-prevention programs. Combined with federal grants, the state is funding tobacco control at only 9.7 percent of the minimum amount recommended by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The General Assembly cut funding for the foundation guiding youth programs from $14.5 million in the 12 months that ended June 30, 2008, to $8.4 million for the current fiscal year that ends June 30.

So why haven’t lawmakers lived up to their word with the tobacco prevention funding? It’s the same old story about the slow economy that has reduced public revenues. But Carr pointed out that the “cuts we have been seeing (for tobacco prevention) have been disproportionate to a lot of other cuts in state government.”

He added that the money has been designated by the national settlement and higher tobacco taxes as a revenue stream for the programs. “The states have a ready source of revenue to fund these programs,” he said.

At least one bill has been introduced in the current Assembly session to raise the state’s cigarette tax from 30 cents per pack to the national average of about $1.45 per pack. About $23 million of that additional revenue would be directed annually to for smoking prevention and cessation programs.

The money for those programs was a pact of sorts by the state with its young people to sponsor programs designed to discourage them from smoking or using other tobacco products. Unfortunately, the state has let them — and their parents — down.

Virginia can do a far better job of funding programs designed to discourage smoking and the use of tobacco products. It should not have to be reminded about its failures by the American Lung Association.