What is the demand for youth tobacco cessation assistance in Wisconsin?

1. What is the demand for youth tobacco cessation assistance in Wisconsin? Joanna Y. Marks1, Randall L. Glysch, MS2, and Nathan R. Jones, PhD1 Results Introduction Findings & Public Health Initiatives Tobacco use is the leading preventable cause of death in Wisconsin and the United States. Given the risk of smoking initiation during adolescence and the addictive nature of cigarettes, cessation assistance for adolescents is an important component of comprehensive tobacco control in addition to prevention efforts. Many youth possess the motivation to quit but, like adults, need support and proven intervention strategies to maintain long-term abstinence from smoking. By meeting the need for youth cessation assistance, Wisconsin can reduce the burden of young people’s smoking on their health, and the state as a whole, before it becomes even greater. This poster describes the declining prevalence of youth cigarette smoking, the distribution of youth smokers by intensity, and the intentions and attempts to quit among youth smokers in Wisconsin. • Despite the overall decline in youth smoking prevalence and consumption between 2000 and 2008, the changes in the percentages of youth wanting to quit smoking and youth attempting to quit smoking in the past year were not statistically significant. • Wisconsin offers several programs to support adolescents who want to reduce or stop smoking, including: • Not On Tobacco (N-O-T), a nationally recognized voluntary teen cessation program developed by the American Lung Association and West Virginia University. In Wisconsin, N-O-T includes a new component to reach at-risk groups and address disparities in teen smoking. • Telephone counseling through the Wisconsin Quit Line. • Teens Against Tobacco (TATU), a peer education program to reduce youth tobacco use. • Fighting Against Corporate Tobacco (FACT), a youth-driven activism campaign, including counter marketing and legislative testimony. • Department of Public Instruction grants to school districts for local collaborations. • In addition to individual assistance, Wisconsin youth benefit from related strategies to affect supply and demand for cigarette use, including cost increases, reduced access to tobacco products, changes in social norms, restrictions on smoking in certain locations, and greater awareness about the negative consequences of tobacco use. Methods Data on Wisconsin students in public middle and high schools were obtained from the 2000 and 2008 Wisconsin Youth Tobacco Surveys (YTS). A two-stage cluster sample design was used to produce samples representative of public middle and high schools. At the first stage, schools were selected with probability proportional to enrollment. At the second stage, classes from each sampled school were selected with systematic equal probability. All students in the selected classes were eligible to participate in the survey. Overall response rates were above 60% for all years. Current smokers were defined as students who smoked on at least one day in the past 30 days. Frequent smokers were defined as students who smoked 20 or more days in the past month. A weighting factor was applied to each student record to adjust for sample selection (school and class levels) and non-response (school, class, and student levels). A final adjustment sums the weights by grade and sex to the population of schoolchildren in the selected grades in each county. SUDAAN, a software package for statistical analysis of correlated data, was used to compute standard errors of the estimates and produce 95% confidence intervals (CI). Conclusion Wisconsin is doing well in reducing the prevalence of youth smoking and offering cessation assistance for youth, but work remains. Despite current program offerings and declining percentages of youth smoking, youth continue to express a strong interest in smoking cessation. An emphasis on evidence-based programming, coupled with innovations and technology, will be important to meet this need. A statewide smoking ban in July 2010 and a pending state cigarette tax increase will help address social norms and sensitivity to price. Through comprehensive efforts, Wisconsin can continue to address its prevalence of high, sustained interest in cessation among youth. Source: Wisconsin Youth Tobacco Survey, 2000 and 2008. Affiliations 1 Tobacco Surveillance and Evaluation Program, University of Wisconsin Paul P. Carbone Comprehensive Cancer Center 2 Wisconsin Division of Public Health, Department of Health Services This research was supported by the Wisconsin Department of Health Services, Division of Public Health, Bureau of Community Health Promotion, Wisconsin Tobacco Prevention and Control Program.