EDITORIAL: Missouri is last - dead last

Jan. 13--Of the 46 states receiving a legal settlement from major tobacco companies, Missouri ranks last in the dollar amount it spends on programs with the goal of preventing or helping people to stop smoking.

That's right. Our state has collected billions and billions in settlement money since 1998, the year tobacco companies were required to pay out more than $246 billion over time as compensation for tobacco-related health care costs. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommended that Missouri should spend $72.9 million on those programs each year. We aren't even close. Last year, we received $258.9 million in revenue and spent $48,500 -- less than 0.1 percent -- of the money on prevention and cessation.

Today's Page 1 story outlines the state's use of the settlement money. After reading the story, we think you will agree with us that Missouri is failing.

So how does the state, and other states for that matter, get away with using the settlement money to shore up its general revenue fund? It's because the settlement didn't include any teeth. The purpose is to help decrease youth smoking and promote public health, but there are no requirements to do so. Yet, for 20 years we keep doing the same thing over and over again. Expectations do not match up with the reality.

Cody Smith, R-Carthage, Missouri's new budget chairman, acknowledges legislators have come to depend on the tobacco money to meet commitments in the state's $28 billion budget. Without it, it seems that we would fall short.

In our view, that doesn't excuse the state from being such poor stewards of the money. The CDC says tobacco-prevention programs and policies are the best way to reduce smoking and health care costs. Tobacco kills almost half a million Americans each year and is costing $170 billion in health care expenses. In Missouri, there are 11,000 deaths each year caused by smoking.

While we spend very little on smoking prevention programs, we also refuse to raise our tax on cigarettes. At 17 cents, we have the lowest tobacco tax in the nation. Health experts say that in addition to smoking prevention programs for kids, smoking can be reduced by raising taxes on cigarettes.

Lawmakers passed a 4-cents-a-pack increase in 1993, and that's the last time the tax has been raised. Voters in Missouri rejected new taxes on cigarettes in 2002, 2006, 2012 and 2016.

The combination of our lawmakers failure to use more of the tobacco settlement money for its intended use and the public's reluctance to pass any new taxes on cigarettes is a deadly one.

There is one more strategy to reduce tobacco use: raise the legal age to buy tobacco products to 21. In Missouri, those 18 and older can buy tobacco products. But state law does not keep municipalities from raising the legal sale age to 21. Columbia became the first to so. It's something Joplin should consider.

But first we need to start caring about the future of our state's health.

___

(c)2019 The Joplin Globe (Joplin, Mo.)

Visit The Joplin Globe (Joplin, Mo.) at www.joplinglobe.com

Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.