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A new University of Wisconsin study set to begin in January is aiming to help troops coping with post-traumatic stress disorder to overcome smoking when they return home.
The study by the UW Center for Tobacco Research and Intervention has a goal of helping soldiers kick their smoking habit.
"A lot of time that you were exhausted and you needed to have some time out," said veteran Deeann Hansen. "We were on a road march and when we were told to stop we were allowed to take a break, and the comment was made to us that, 'Smoke 'em if you got 'em,' and if you don't they told us to pick up cigarette butts and trash."
Studies show Hansen isn't the only one to leave the military addicted to tobacco. It's something she blamed on the high stress load of life in the services.
Around 7 million U.S. vets suffer from PTSD and more than half smoke -- and that statistic is sparking some research.
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A full 42 percent of people in Milwaukee's poorest neighborhoods smoke -- more than twice the national U.S. average -- sacrificing $9 on a pack of cigarettes even while most of the households reported earning less than $15,000 a year.
Even more troubling is the fact that a large number of these low-income smokers hold beliefs that make them less likely to quit, according to ongoing research from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Over the past 40 years or so, the overall smoking rate in the United States has decreased to about 20 percent, but those gains have taken place largely among people with resources, namely money and education, said Bruce Christiansen, an associate scientist with the University of Wisconsin Center for Tobacco Research and Intervention in Madison, who is one of the researchers on what's known as the "ZIP Code" project.
"With public health, we got 80 percent of the people who were going to quit smoking to quit smoking. That's great, but the next 20 percent is going to be tough," added Dr. Jay Brooks, chairman of hematology/oncology at Ochsner Health System in New Orleans. "Smoking tends to be a disease of poverty and lack of education. Thirty years ago, 50 percent of the population smoked and now we're down to roughly 25 percent. What we have left is a very select group of people."
That select group includes people with mental health issues, which, according to the U.S. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Service Administration (SAMHSA), smoke 44 percent of all cigarettes.
[W]e got 80 percent of the people who were going to quit smoking to quit smoking. That's great, but the next 20 percent is going to be tough. Smoking tends to be a disease of poverty and lack of education. Thirty years ago, 50 percent of the population smoked and now we're down to roughly 25 percent. What we have left is a very select group of people.Dr. Jay Brooks, chairman of hematology/oncology at Ochsner Health System in New Orleans.
Wisconsin has become the next-to-last state to require so-called fire-safe cigarettes.
Gov. Jim Doyle signed the bill a year-and-a-half ago and the law took effect on Oct. 1. . . .
Sen. Judy Robson, D-Beloit, tried for five years to require fire-safe cigarettes, soon after New York became the first state to mandate it.
Now, every state but Wyoming has similar laws on the books although some won’t actually take effect until next year or 2011.
While Ahmad, Mussina and the other Wisconsin merchants suffer financially, the tax increases have significantly boosted the revenue of a cash-strapped state, and probably are deterring a lot of smoking.
The retailers say price increases won't stop smokers, but researchers say otherwise, and the potential savings in health care costs are enormous.
On average, according to University of Illinois at Chicago economist Frank J. Chaloupka, every 10% increase in cigarette prices reduces demand by about 4%.
That would suggest that reduced overall smoking accounts for a significant portion - perhaps more than half - of the decrease in cigarette sales following Wisconsin's tax increases.
There's no data yet on the effects of the most recent increase, which took effect Sept. 1. But tax collections before and after the $10-a-carton boost on Jan. 1, 2008, show a dramatic impact.
From fiscal 2007 to fiscal 2009, revenue to the state nearly doubled, to $551 million. But cigarette sales fell by 19% - from 38.5 million cartons in fiscal 2007 to 31.1 million in fiscal 2009.
That's more than a billion fewer cigarettes sold here, and Chaloupka believes most weren't replaced with smokes bought elsewhere.
Starting Thursday, smokers with health insurance who call the state Quit Line for help kicking their habit will get less help, the result of a 55 percent cut in state funding to smoking cessation and anti-smoking programs.
In spite of soaring state cigarette taxes, the Quit Line's funding was slashed by two-thirds - from $3.7 million a year to $1.2 million - as part of the broad cuts implemented in the 2009-11 budget signed by Gov. Jim Doyle to help solve the state's massive deficit. Total funding for anti-tobacco programs was cut from $15.3 million a year to $6.9 million.
The cuts follow a 75-cent increase in the cigarette tax on Sept. 1 that brought the state tax to $2.52 per pack, and also follows a $1-per-pack increase in 2008 - moves made to help solve budget deficits.
Maureen Busalacchi, executive director of SmokeFree Wisconsin, said more resources are needed by smokers motivated to quit by both the tax increase and a state smoking ban on bars and restaurants going into effect on July 5, 2010.
"When people need the resources most, we'll be least able to help them," Busalacchi said.
When I heard that an Eau Claire homeowners association had voted to outlaw smoking in the owner-occupied residential complex, I knew right away the topic had the potential to ignite local controversy. . .. Initially I wondered how so many people from California to Massachusetts and points in between had read my story. I discovered there was a good explanation.
The story made its way to The Associated Press, then to the Drudge Report, a conservative online news site, where it reached a nationwide audience. From there the story took on an even larger life as conservative radio commentator Rush Limbaugh discussed it. . . .
I didn't hear the segment in which he addressed the matter but found a transcript online where he likened the smoking ban to "a communist idea" from somewhere other than Washington, D.C. Limbaugh and people calling his show apparently bashed the ban and the man who proposed it, Dave Hanvelt, the Fairfax Park Homeowners Association president. . . .
Here's a little secret most of those criticizing Hanvelt's political leanings apparently don't know: He's a conservative. In fact, he's a staunch conservative. . . .
"We accept these restrictions when we choose to live here," Hanvelt said, noting the smoking ban is about public health, not politics.
That makes sense to me, or certainly more sense than the rantings of people demonizing the Fairfax Park ban as the end of freedom for all. When compared to logic, those arguments go up in smoke.
It's not just indoor public places in Eau Claire where lighting up is prohibited. Now residents of a south side, owner-occupied housing complex will have to snuff out smoking in their homes, the most recent sign of public anti-smoking sentiment.
Members of the Fairfax Parkside Homeowners Association on Wednesday voted to outlaw smoking inside residences that are part of the 34-unit development. The ban also prohibits smoking in shared spaces, such as porches and garages, but does allow it in yards and on patios.
Of the 19 association members who voted on the issue, 15 favored the anti-smoking regulation proposed by association President Dave Hanvelt, while four argued that residents should be allowed to smoke in their homes.
"This doesn't restrict a smoker from living here," Hanvelt said of the smoking prohibition. "It just means that there are restrictions on where they can smoke."
There's no doubt that smoking or being around smokers is a health risk.
But, isn't just about anything we do a risky? Other than sitting inside all day and doing nothing, every single step we take involves some chances. . . .
I find it interesting that nonsmokers who go to bars and want the smoking ban because of health concerns, pour liver-damaging alcohol into their bodies. I find it ironic that Doyle says he tries so hard to keep and help business in the state, but signs a bill that will undoubtedly hurt bars and restaurants.
So, thanks to the state government for telling me as a customer and the many restaurant and bar owners what's best for us all as the further eroding of our freedoms in this country continue.
Good luck bars and restaurants. As if things weren't tough enough in the current economy.
Lost jobs in Wisconsin was an argument used against a statewide smoking ban that will go into effect next year. But two other Midwestern states that have smoking bans say they has not significantly affected employment in restaurants and bars.
Before Minnesota and Ohio approved their bans, restaurant and bar owners said they’d lose business if customers weren’t allowed to smoke. But researchers from those states who tracked employment data over three years found job loss was very minimal, not even statistically relevant. . . .
Although there are only predictions of what economic impact a statewide smoking ban will have, there are community examples. In Madison, public health officials noted that there was more liquor licenses sold after the city’s ban was enacted in 2005.
Gov. Jim Doyle signed a smoking ban Monday, making bars, restaurants and other workplaces smoke-free starting next summer.
"It's time for every person in Wisconsin to breathe freely at restaurants, taverns, and workplaces across the state," Doyle said in a statement. "A smoke-free Wisconsin will save money in health care costs, improve public health and save lives."
Doyle signed the bill at Cempazuchi, 1205 E. Brady St., Milwaukee. He's also planning signing ceremonies later Monday at Titletown Brewing Co. in Green Bay and the state Capitol in Madison.
A ban has been a top priority of Doyle's, but lawmakers were unable to reach a deal in the last two-year legislative session. The Democrat-controlled Legislature passed a compromise last week that bans smoking in virtually all workplaces but delays the start date until July 5, 2010 - later than Doyle and other supporters wanted.
After years of political wrangling, Gov. Jim Doyle and a Democratic legislature have pushed through an indoor smoking ban by forging a compromise between the Wisconsin Tavern League and public health advocacy groups.
Hindsight is 20/20, so does the new law represent a triumph for public health, an erosion of civil liberties or both? For Rob Swearingen, president of the Tavern League of Wisconsin, the compromise represents the best deal for his membership in an adverse political climate, but he stands by his organization’s position that the smoking ban is the government interfering with the rights of business owners.
“Ultimately what happened is that people lost their rights,” Swearingen said. “It’s another erosion of rights.”
Swearingen, a Rhinelander native who made his political mark organizing the Oneida County Tavern League against a city smoking ban, has been at the center of the statewide debate after he assumed leadership of the 5,000 member state tavern association.
Recently, that leadership has entailed negotiating the terms of surrender in a heated debate over the public health impact of secondhand smoke. Swearingen said the compromise reached on the smoking ban was the best deal the tavern league could get. . . .
The major elements of the compromise are a 14-month delay in the ban’s implementation, a preemption clause that restricts municipalities from implementing stricter measures and protects outdoor smoking, and a more lenient schedule of fines for offending businesses.
But the reality is that next July 5 there won’t be one smoke-filled barroom left in a state that takes a certain measure of pride in its drinking culture.
For Swearingen, protecting that culture is important. . . .
I’ve been with people who worked in restaurants for 40 years and didn’t have so much as a wheeze. To this day I’ve never seen a death certificate secondhand smoke as the cause of death.”
Dr. Chris Koeppl, internal medicine physician with Ministry Medical Group in Rhinelander and a member of the Wisconsin Medical Society, believes he knows why Swearingen has never seen secondhand smoke listed as a cause of death.
“What we put on the death certificate is cancer or chronic pulmonary disease,” Koeppl said. “I guess I would say that 60,000 deaths per year is a significant community of people. There were 54,000 Americans killed in Vietnam and everyone knows about the public outcry that generated.” . . .
For Koeppl, the bottom line is that the presence of secondhand smoke in a confined area presents a clear health risk that is entirely preventable. Wisconsin’s new indoor smoking ban represents the government’s responsibility to effect that prevention.
“Whether its one death or 60,000, it’s a preventable disease, and not everything is,” Koeppl said. “The steps for prevention are simple — you just say smoking is not allowed in closed areas where people will breathe increased concentrations of secondhand smoke.” . . .
Crossing state lines into Wisconsin has been an option for many Minnesotans dead-set on smoking in bars. But that will change next year under the state's recently passed smoking ban.
Gov. Jim Doyle plans to sign the ban, which will make smoking illegal in almost every workplace in the state when it takes effect July 2010.
Mike Maguire, spokesman for the American Cancer Society, calls the new policy "a step forward for the health of folks in Wisconsin."
But walk into Ellie's On Main in Hudson, and you'd be hard pressed to find someone who agrees with him.
Smoking would be banned in restaurants, bars and other businesses starting in July 2010 under a bill the Legislature passed Wednesday.
Democratic Gov. Jim Doyle, who has made an indoor smoking ban a priority, pledged to sign the measure.
"Today, Wisconsin is taking an important step to save lives and protect our kids and citizens from the scourge of tobacco," Doyle said in a statement.
"I wish the ban would be implemented sooner, but I am proud the state is embracing the healthy direction the world is going. Making Wisconsin smoke-free will save money in health care costs, improve public health across the state and save lives."
The measure passed the Senate 25-8 and the Assembly 61-38.
Virtually all workplaces would become smoke-free on July 5, 2010.
The Tavern League of Wisconsin fought the ban for years. Though the group lost the battle, it won a concession by delaying the start date a year.
The state Senate voted by a 25-8 margin Wednesday for a July 5, 2010, statewide indoor smoking ban - a vote that sent the bill to the Assembly, which hoped to pass it later today.The ban, a top priority of Democratic Gov. Jim Doyle, was largely a compromise that gave taverns a year to build outdoor smoking areas and make other changes to accommodate their customers.
The Tavern League of Wisconsin had fought the ban for years, but its members got a one-year delay.Assembly members stayed at the Capitol to pass the smoking ban and, if they do, the bill would go to Doyle for his signature.
If the Assembly makes any change, the ban would have to go back to the Senate. That could occur Thursday morning
Arguments aside, the way leading lawmakers handled the issue of a potential statewide smoking ban in taverns and restaurants this week was not in the spirit of a more transparent government.
The two committee chairman handling the bill -- Jon Erpenbach and Jon Richards -- gave a just a shade more than the required 24-hour notice before holding a hearing and then voting on the bill.
With the Democrats now in control of the dome, it's expected that the ban will sail through the Legislature swimmingly, so there was really no reason for legislative subterfuge.
Republicans were in the majority and able to block such efforts last year. Gov. Jim Doyle tried to shove this policy in the budget, but Democratic leadership thought that move even less transparent and figured this would be a better dog-and-pony show.
It didn't get past Milwaukee Ald. Bob Donovan, who sent out a scathing press release about the under-the-radar hearings.
"It now seems Gov. Doyle and some state legislators are willing to throw out the constitution on their crusade to snuff out smoking," . . .
The Cigar Store Alliance of Wisconsin showed up in force, telling the committee that they have invested hundreds of thousands of dollars on ventilation and air purification systems and other amenities. They unanimously said that a smoking ban would shut down their businesses. The response to the cigar group from anti-smoking folks was that it was too bad that they made a bad business decision given the environment towards smoking.
A more interesting comment came from a women identified as "Miss Thompson." She sees the anti-smoking folks as conducting a "witch hunt" and that it's a "Nazi ideology that the individual belongs to the state" and that victims are being kept in the dark by a "censured media" while government is "totally corrupt and out of control."
Sometimes, the advocates for the ban got their facts confused, with one Lung Association representative saying that four of every five people are non-smokers and another Lung Association rep asserting that the figures are three non-smokers for every four people.