CDC Report Ties State Effort to Smoking Rates

States’ efforts to fight smoking have been uneven, which may explain why smoking rates in some states have declined twice as fast as in others, HealthDay News reported March 12.

A new report from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) concluded that state-to-state variations in tobacco-control programs and tobacco-marketing programs explain why adult smoking rates are twice as high in some states as others. For example, 28 percent of Kentucky residents smoke, as do 27 percent of Virginians, while the smoking rate in California is just 14 percent, and in Utah is 12 percent.

The CDC said that only Utah is on track to meet the federal goal of reducing smoking to 12 percent nationally by 2010, but said more states could hit the Healthy People 2010 target if they adopted comprehensive, evidence-based tobacco-control programs.

Smoking rates declined in 44 U.S. states between 1998 and 2007, but not at all in six states.

The study was published in the March 13, 2009 issue of the CDC’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.