South Carolina ranks last in tobacco prevention spending

Source: Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids COLUMBIA _ Ten years after the tobacco settlement, South Carolina has slid back to its worst-in-the-nation status in what it spends to keep people from smoking, according a report released Tuesday by a coalition of public health groups.

South Carolina will collect $114 million this year from the tobacco settlement and taxes, but it is the only state that doesn't plan to spend any state money to help people quit smoking and prevent others from taking up the habit.

It had shared that distinction with Connecticut, but legislators there were considering a plan Tuesday to add nearly $7 million to its federal spending, and the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids used the proposed figures in the report.

In South Carolina, a $1 million grant from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention will pay for a scaled-back 800-number quit line and some education in the schools, state officials said.

"South Carolina is the most disappointing state in the nation when it comes to funding programs to protect kids from tobacco," Matthew Myers, president of Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, said in a release. "Tobacco prevention is a smart investment that reduces smoking, saves lives and saves money by reducing tobacco-related health care costs."

The report, titled "A Decade of Broken Promises," ranks states by comparing how much they spend in both federal and state money to what the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends they spend.

This year, the federal agency recommends South Carolina spend $62 million. It has issued recommendations since the November 1998 tobacco settlement between the industry and states. South Carolina has consistently ranked at or near the bottom of the annual comparison.

No state spends what the federal agency recommends, though Alaska comes the closest at $9.2 million, or 86 percent of what's recommended.

For the last two years, South Carolina contributed $2 million to smoking cessation and prevention, boosting the state to 38th in the rankings in 2006 and 45th in 2007. But the state allocation was eliminated with the economic downturn and a failed attempt to increase cigarette taxes. Before 2006-07, the state spent nothing for several years.

The public health groups releasing the report, which also include the American Heart and American Lung associations, called on South Carolina lawmakers to raise the lowest-in-the-nation cigarette tax, which has stood at 7 cents a pack for 31 years.

Earlier this year, the Legislature approved a plan that would have raised the tax by 50 cents and put most of the money toward health care, with $5 million a year going to smoking cessation and prevention. But the plan died after legislators were unable to override the veto of Gov. Mark Sanford, who wanted to use the money to cut income taxes.

Sanford spokesman Joel Sawyer said the governor wants to reduce the health care costs of smoking and is not opposed to prevention programs. He noted the governor successfully pushed in August to charge state employees who smoke a monthly fee on their health insurance plans, set to begin in January 2010. The governor wanted the surcharge to start sooner.

"We have said for six years we would veto a cigarette tax increase if it wasn't tied to a corresponding decrease," Sawyer said. "In regards to how the money is spent, if anything is included that made the bill a net tax increase, we'd veto it."

Legislators intend to try raising the cigarette tax again.

President Pro Tem Glenn McConnell said that while South Carolina will likely not come close to the $62 million recommendation, it must do better. The Charleston Republican said he would support a cigarette tax increase next year, if the money goes to helping people get health care and education programs that prevent people from smoking.

But there is good news.

Since 1999, the youth smoking rate in South Carolina, an historically tobacco-friendly state, has dropped by half, from 36 percent to 18 percent.

For the 22 percent of South Carolina's adults who already smoke, the state has continued its tobacco quit line with the federal money, though it has scaled back its follow-up counseling sessions. Since August, the line has received an average of more than 200 calls monthly.

In the past, everyone who called got five return intervention calls. Now those are limited to smokers who are uninsured, on Medicaid or pregnant, said Mary-Kathryn Craft from the Department of Health and Environmental Control's tobacco prevention division.

Other callers get just the initial talk with a quit coach, though workers on the state's health plan have access to a similar quit-for-life counseling program.

THE TOBACCO TOLL

A look at the toll of tobacco in South Carolina:

5,900 adults die yearly because they smoke 6,300 children under 18 become new habitual smokers each year 45,300 high school students smoke (18 percent) 240,000 kids are exposed to second-hand smoke at home 718,600 adults smoke (22 percent) $1.1 billion, estimated cost of health care caused by smoking