{"id":41799,"date":"2013-02-04T10:00:28","date_gmt":"2013-02-04T15:00:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/?p=41799"},"modified":"2013-02-04T08:30:16","modified_gmt":"2013-02-04T13:30:16","slug":"do-not-cut-funding-to-tobacco-control-programs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/?p=41799","title":{"rendered":"Do Not Cut Funding to Tobacco Control Programs"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>To the Editor:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/Opinion-Your-Voice.bmp\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-thumbnail wp-image-41338\" alt=\"Opinion Your Voice\" src=\"http:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/Opinion-Your-Voice.bmp\" \/><\/a>(Oneida, NY \u2013 Feb. 2013) Over the past six years, New York has raised $10.6 billion in tobacco revenues.\u00a0Less than 4 percent of those funds have been used for tobacco control programs.\u00a0\u00a0For the past three years, funding has been cut for the tobacco control programs in New York State.<\/p>\n<p>Helping individuals quit smoking and preventing them from starting to smoke is crucial.\u00a0\u00a0The toll that tobacco use takes on New York State is devastating.\u00a0\u00a0In 2009, 25,400 lives were lost due to tobacco use.\u00a0\u00a0Tobacco use costs New Yorkers an estimated $8.17 billion in health care costs, including $2.7 billion in Medicaid costs.<\/p>\n<p>It is crucial that funding for tobacco control programs continues.\u00a0\u00a0The programs have been proven to reduce youth smoking and help current smokers to quit.\u00a0Limited funding prevents the tobacco control program\u00a0from reaching the most vulnerable populations that have the highest rate of smoking.<\/p>\n<p>There are numerous things that tobacco control programs could do with more resources.\u00a0\u00a0Additional resources for adult cessation would be helpful.\u00a0\u00a0With additional resources, the program could increase their work with disadvantaged urban neighborhoods and rural areas. Lastly, the funding could assist the program in developing and implementing strategies for reaching those with mental illness or addictive disorders.\u00a0\u00a0The mentally ill smoke at twice the rate of the general public.<\/p>\n<p>Tobacco control programs save lives and save money.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Marianne Simberg, Oneida\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>To the Editor: (Oneida, NY \u2013 Feb. 2013) Over the past six years, New York has raised $10.6 billion in tobacco revenues.\u00a0Less than 4 percent of those funds have been used for tobacco control programs.\u00a0\u00a0For the past three years, funding has been cut for the tobacco control programs in New York State. Helping individuals quit [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[13636,16151],"class_list":["post-41799","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-marianne-simberg","tag-oneida-ny-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p43meu-aSb","jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41799","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=41799"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41799\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=41799"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=41799"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=41799"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}