Medical School unveils plan for use of tobacco settlement funds

Direct outreach, education, public service will be the focus

A five-part plan, including a toll-free stop-smoking helpline and a program to prevent smoking among adolescent girls, will send $2 million in state tobacco settlement money to communities around the state of Wisconsin, officials at the UW Medical School announced today (Dec. 15, 1999).

The school’s Center for Tobacco Research and Intervention (CTRI), a national leader in research efforts to help people stop smoking, received $2 million in the recently passed state budget for tobacco control efforts. The funds are part of the settlement negotiated with major tobacco companies, which were sued by Wisconsin and many other states.

“It is important that these funds have impact across the state,” said Dr. Michael Fiore, a physician and CTRI director. “Therefore, we’ve developed programs that emphasize direct service to the people of Wisconsin and that support activities throughout the entire state.”

The five-part plan includes the following:

• An annual statewide survey tracking tobacco use in Wisconsin. This state “tobacco report card” will not only measure trends in tobacco use, but will help clinicians and researchers fine-tune prevention and smoking-cessation programs. This will reveal the effectiveness of smoking prevention and treatment efforts and will show which smokers are most in need of help.
• A statewide partnership with the Wisconsin Women’s Health Foundation to help prevent smoking among young women, one of the groups in which smoking rates have jumped substantially. CTRI teamed up with the Foundation earlier this year for a program in which thousands of women across the state received nicotine patches at no cost. A random survey of 500 women in the program showed that 22 percent — well above the norm — remained off cigarettes six months after they quit.
• A statewide educational and outreach effort based in the state’s five health regions including Milwaukee, Green Bay, Rhinelander, La Crosse and Madison. Each of these regions will have a specialist specifically dedicated to bring tobacco cessation and prevention activities and programs to schools, clinics, hospitals and other community settings.
• A “mini-grant” program that will support local research efforts in smoking cessation and prevention. These grants of up to $25,000 will specifically target activities in the five health regions of the state.
• A toll-free helpline offering counseling to smokers trying to quit. This component will provide Wisconsin residents who want to quit smoking access to counselors who will help them develop individualized quitting programs. Similar programs already implemented in Oregon, Arizona, California and Massachusetts are popular and have proven effective.

Fiore said planning for the new programs is already underway. He expects that most programs will be in place by this spring. Because of the costs associated with the helpline, however, this program will require additional funding.

“The CTRI programs are part of a new statewide effort to reduce the illness, deaths and costs resulting from tobacco use in Wisconsin,” said Fiore. “CTRI will work collaboratively with the Wisconsin Department of Health and Family Services, the new state Tobacco Control Board and other entities committed to these efforts.”