• Respiratory Therapist Full Time and Part Time! • Compliance Specialist Great Facility! • Quality Assurance Reviewer Key Position! • RN Positions Various Status, Various Shifts! To list your ad, contact your classified ad rep: Classified Ad Staff Or Erik Winters 405-475-4033. E-mail: Erik Winters

The association would have us spend these funds immediately solely on the programs it deems important. The people had a better idea in agreeing to create a trust fund to house most settlement moneys and to spend only the earnings from that trust fund.

Oklahoma got an "F" from the association in how it funds smoking cessation programs. This meaningless grade by an increasingly militant association ignores the fiscal crisis extant in this state and in most others. That states have tapped tobacco settlement funds to help balance their budgets is regrettable, but how much worse would the crisis be if the money instead had been drawn down by cessation programs?

We believe the settlement money should be used for health-related programs, including smoking cessation, because the lawsuit that led to the settlement was justified on the basis of health care costs incurred by the states as a result of tobacco use.

Nevertheless, smoking remains voluntary. No one is forced to smoke, and it's questionable whether a substantial chunk of the settlement money should be used to help smokers quit. Some funding for cessation programs is justified, but it's frankly none of the association's business how the people and their representatives choose to spend the settlement proceeds.

Anti-tobacco militants are active on several fronts in the state, pushing an absurd $1-a- pack increase in the cigarette tax (a doubling of the 23-cent tax is more reasonable) and bypassing the Legislature in adopting smoking restrictions in restaurants.

Most everyone hates tobacco or is at least not overly fond of it, so cigarettes are an easy target for health advocacy groups. Their well-intentioned campaign to reduce smoking is not unwelcome. But when this campaign strays into militant nagging, we will beg to differ.

So far, Oklahoma has gotten $244 million from the 1998 tobacco settlement. It may eventually get more than $2 billion from this source. Nearly $100 million has been placed in the trust fund, with the rest being absorbed by the general fund.

It's a shame that all of the money didn't go into the trust fund, but that is water under the bridge. Under terms of the measure approved by voters, no more than 75 percent of the settlement's annual proceeds will ever go into the fund.

Local Lung Association officials now complain that it will take too long for the fund to start earning enough interest to pay for their desired programs. Tough. The fund was established to create an ongoing source of money for health programs. Would the association rather we dissolved the fund and spend its large balance solely on cessation programs?

Surely not. When that money is spent, what would the state do then?

Oklahoma is doing the best it can to fund anti-smoking programs with the money available. And it's funny how the lower the smoking rate goes, the more the Lung Association claims tobacco use is at "epidemic" proportions.

We are not alone. Most states haven't used much of their settlement money for cessation programs. Perhaps the people and lawmakers in those states remain unconvinced that general health care, schools, corrections, highways and other programs are a lower priority than helping the shrinking minority of smokers become nonsmokers.

Archives: More information on this topic from The Oklahoman.
Subscribe to The Oklahoman.