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Statement by the American Legacy Foundation® on Youth Smoking Rates

12/11/2008

Monitoring the Future Study Finds Youth Daily Smoking at Historically Low Levels

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Encouraging new data announced in today’s Monitoring the Future study shows teen smoking rates are at their lowest levels in the survey’s history. Among 8^th, 10^th and 12^th graders – all groups surveyed each year by the study – teen smoking rates are at their lowest point since at least 1991. Students indicating cigarette use during the prior 30 days stands at 7 percent for 8^th graders; 12 percent for 10^th graders, and 20 percent for 12^th graders, respectively. The report, now in its 34th year, is the most respected source for data about youth smoking.

Also reported in today's announcement:

·         8^th graders’ smoking rates are down by two-thirds; 10^th graders by more than half; and 12^th graders’ rates by nearly half since recent peaks in the mid-90s.

·         Overall smoking prevalence for the three grades stood at 12.6 percent in 2008, down from 13.6 percent in 2007.

·         Smoking rate declines were greatest among males and students who say they are college-bound.

·         Use of smokeless or “spit” tobacco remained level this year; with four percent of 8^th graders, five percent of 10^th graders, and seven percent of 12^th graders reporting using smokeless tobacco in the prior 30 days, respectively.

The public health community, doctors and parents must work together to foster a continued rate of decline. The Master Settlement Agreement reached in 1998 between attorneys general from 46 states, five US territories and the tobacco industry provided our country with a unique opportunity – and with focused funding -- to address youth smoking and help smokers who want to quit.

The American Legacy Foundation, the national public health foundation devoted to keeping young people from smoking and helping all smokers quit, has been committed to finding new ways to reach and engage with the teen audience, with the ultimate goal of reducing youth smoking prevalence. This is especially important as the tobacco industry continues to successfully market its products and addict new smokers.

Eighty percent of all smokers have their first cigarette before age 18^[1], and every day 1,500 youth become daily smokers^[2]. These daily smokers will continue down a path of tobacco-related diseases and will incur higher healthcare costs than nonsmoking Americans. Funding youth smoking-prevention efforts could prevent these ill effects.

Parents also play an important role in keeping their kids smoke-free, and here are Ten Tips to Help Parents Do So:

1. Be a role model.

2. Designate your house as a smoke-free zone.

3. Keep trying to quit. (Please visit http://www.becomeanex.org/ for tips on quitting, including how you can re-learn your life without cigarettes.)

4. Don’t smoke around your children, even in the car.

5. Educate your children to be savvy consumers of media.

6. Inform your children about the health risks associated with smoking.

7. Know your children’s friends.

8. Listen carefully to your children and be a sounding board for them.

9. Build skills early on.

10. If they start to smoke, encourage them in an attempt to quit.

For more information about these tips, please visit http://www.americanlegacy.org/.

Earlier this year, the National Cancer Institute released a report, The Role of the Media in Promoting and Reducing Tobacco Use found that much tobacco advertising targets the psychological needs of adolescents, such as popularity, peer acceptance and positive self-image. And that even brief exposure to tobacco advertising influences adolescents’ attitudes and perceptions about smoking and smokers, and adolescents’ intentions to smoke.

The report also concludes that mass media campaigns can reduce smoking, especially when combined with other tobacco control strategies. However, youth smoking prevention campaigns sponsored by the tobacco industry have been generally ineffective and may actually have increased youth smoking.

The foundation's truth^® youth smoking prevention campaign is a national effort that delivers facts and messages to teens about tobacco, but avoids giving directive statements telling youths not to smoke. Research has indicated that in the first two years of the campaign, 22 percent of the overall decline in youth smoking was directly attributable to truth^®. As the only organization directing a national media campaign for youth smoking prevention – other than the tobacco industry -- Legacy hopes that funding will continue and grow for efforts like its truth^® campaign and state-specific campaigns.

The American Legacy Foundation^® is dedicated to building a world where young people reject tobacco and anyone can quit. Located in Washington, D.C., the foundation develops programs that address the health effects of tobacco use, especially among vulnerable populations disproportionately affected by the toll of tobacco, through grants, technical assistance and training, partnerships, youth activism, and counter-marketing and grassroots marketing campaigns. The foundation’s programs include truth^®, a national youth smoking prevention campaign that has been cited as contributing to significant declines in youth smoking; EX^®, an innovative public health program designed to speak to smokers in their own language and change the way they approach quitting; research initiatives exploring the causes, consequences and approaches to reducing tobacco use; and a nationally-renowned program of outreach to priority populations. The American Legacy Foundation was created as a result of the November 1998 Master Settlement Agreement (MSA) reached between attorneys general from 46 states, five U.S. territories and the tobacco industry. Visit http://www.americanlegacy.org/.

truth^®, launched in February 2000, is the largest national youth smoking prevention campaign and the only national campaign not directed by the tobacco industry. The campaign exposes the tactics of the tobacco industry, the truth about addiction, health effects and social consequences of smoking and allows teens to make informed choices about tobacco use by giving them the facts about the industry and its products. The campaign was created by the American Legacy Foundation^®, which was founded as a result of the 1998 Master Settlement Agreement between the tobacco industry and 46 states. Payments to the American Legacy Foundation are made on behalf of the settling states.

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