Maryland doesn’t spend enough money on tobacco prevention programs, a gap that earned the state mixed scores on an American Lung Association report card released Tuesday.
“Until you invest, you are not going to see those reductions in the health costs and expenditures,” said Deborah Bryan, regional vice president of advocacy for the American Lung Association of the Atlantic Coast, which serves Maryland, Virginia and North Carolina.
Maryland funds tobacco prevention at 32 percent of the level recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, officials said. This level of fiscal 2008 funding — $20.5 million compared with the recommended $63.3 million — earned the state an F for tobacco prevention spending.
Overall, Maryland earned two F’s, one A and one B in the report card that tracks progress on state and federal tobacco control policies.
Maryland received the second F for failing to provide adequate access to services to help quit smoking. The state’s Medicaid program covers only a few of medications, and the state employee health plan covers only phone counseling and no medications, according to the American Lung Association.
“People need all the support they can get,” Bryan said.
Maryland’s Clean Air Act of 2007, which went into effect in February, earned the state an A for having strong smoke-free air laws. The state’s $2 per pack cigarette tax scored a B.
Most states and the federal government failed to enact anti-smoking policies in 2008, according to the report. No states received all A’s, and seven states scored four F’s.
“Missed opportunities were an all too common theme in 2008,” Charles Connor, president and chief executive officer of the American Lung Association, said Monday in a call with reporters.
The federal government received poor marks for not enacting a bill that would allow the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to regulate the tobacco industry and for failing to raise the 39-cent cigarette tax, according to the report.
