Grant to focus on cutting tobacco use

The Lee County Health Department and the Lee County Coalition for a Drug Free Southwest Florida will spend the next three years trying to cut down on tobacco use locally, thanks to a $580,000 grant from the state Department of Health.

Lee County was one of 15 areas throughout the state that received the funding.

The grant is divided into three sections. The first involves strategic planning; the second part focuses on tobacco use prevention and the third deals with chronic disease prevention.

"We're taking care of the first part and oversight," said Keral Kronseder-Vogt, executive director for the coalition. "The health department will work with kids and special groups, helping them to advocate for change in regulations and public policy in regards to smoking. It will be working on a community level and helping to prevent tobacco use by other people."

Officials are targeting children specifically because statistics show that 89 percent of adult smokers begin before they turn 18.

In the 2006 Florida Youth Survey, the percentage of Lee County high school students who currently use any form of tobacco was listed as 27.8 percent, according to Brendan Donohue, the Tobacco Program Specialist for the Lee County Health Department. Further, he said that 11 percent of middle school children had also used tobacco products. Tobacco use was determined as having used any form of tobacco on one or more times in the last 30 days.

Donohue said those figures are down from 2000.

Some chronic health problems that are associated with tobacco use include cancers, respiratory problems, stroke and heart disease.

The risk of dying from lung cancer is more than 22 times higher among men who smoke cigarettes and about 12 times higher among women who smoke cigarettes compared with non-smokers, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Cigarette smokers are two to four times more likely to develop coronary heart disease than nonsmokers and double their risk of having a stroke, according to the site. Additionally, 90 percent of all deaths from chronic obstructive lung diseases are attributable to cigarette smoking.

In 2006, 72.2 percent of Lee County middle school students and 68.6 percent of Lee County high school students believed that smoking 'definitely does not' help young people fit in or look cool, according to Donohue. Additionally, he said that the same survey revealed that 29.4 percent of Lee's middle school students and 28.7 percent of high school students believed that smokers do not have more friends than non-smokers.

Still, he said that leaves a sizeable percentage of students with some misperceptions regarding smokers and non-smokers.

"The grant wants to address the true norms and correct misconceptions among our youth," Donohue said. "The grant has a strong emphasis on youth, as well as community partnerships, development of community-wide action plans, and chronic diseases, resulting from first hand or second hand smoke exposure."

In order to qualify for the grant, organizations had to show they had a history of implementing tobacco use prevention programs and would be able to provide a good, well-planned schedule of events for the next three years.

The grant requires the two organizations to provide outcome measures showing the used the money to reduce incidents of smoking and change public policy.

Until the strategic planning is complete, which examines what is being done and where there are gaps, officials are unsure of what public policies specifically will be targeted.

"We're just thrilled that they are recognizing that there is no such thing as a quick fix or a silver bullet," said Kronseder-Vogt. ¦