Mississippi parallels the nation with smoking being the leading cause of preventable death. A major cause of concern is the increasingly common use of tobacco in youth. Six tobacco companies have pledged a total of $246 billion over 25 years to settle lawsuits filed by 50 states. This is a momentous opportunity for states to make significant progress in curtailing tobacco use. In an effort to promote tobacco cessation among youth, and to prevent initiation of tobacco use by youth, the Partnership for a Healthy Mississippi (PHM) sponsors twenty-six community-youth partnerships to reach Mississippi at its core - the communities. These coalitions tailor youth tobacco prevention/intervention programs to their individual community's inherent social, demographic, and economic characteristics. In 1999-2000, survey data was collected to determine if community-youth partnerships were effecting a change in behaviors and attitudes toward tobacco use at the community level. Summarily, the researchers' quest was to answer the following questions: 1) Has youth smoking behavior changed? 2) Has exposure to environmental tobacco smoking (ETS) decreased? 3) Is it more difficult for youth to purchase tobacco since the inception of CYPs? 4) Are schools doing more to teach youth about the hazards of tobacco? This seminal data suggests that CYPs have been of paramount importance in changing youth smoking behavior with their awareness activities and prevention programs. Community-based youth partnerships have been able to galvanize coalitions formed with other local organizations to combat teen smoking in their areas.
Learning Objectives: "At the conclusion of the session, the participant (learner) in this session will be able to: 1. Describe how successful community youth-led partnerships have been in expanding the number of tobacco use prevention and control activities in their local schools and communities. 2. List several ways that community-youth partnerships have been effective in increasing local clean indoor air policy implementation and enforcing compliance to such policies. 3. Discuss the issues concerning minority participation in tobacco prevention activities. 4. Evaluate the effectiveness of community-based partnerships in establishing or increasing youth tobacco cessation programs.
Keywords: Youth, Tobacco Control
Presenting author's disclosure statement:
Organization/institution whose products or services will be discussed: None
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.