According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, smoking costs Californian taxpayers $9 billion every year in health care costs, and much more in lost productivity. This translates into smoking-caused costs of $15 per pack of cigarettes. And yet, at just 87 cents per pack, California's tobacco tax is one of the lowest in the nation.
That doesn't make sense and, this June, we'll have the chance to do something about it.
On June 5, Californians will have the opportunity to pass Proposition 29, the California Cancer Research Act. By adding $1 tax per pack of cigarettes and equivalent tax on other tobacco products, Prop 29 will save an estimated 104,500 lives from premature smoking-caused deaths, prevent 228,700 children from becoming adult smokers and save Californian taxpayers an estimated $5.1 billion in long-term health costs from declines in smoking.
What's more, passage of Prop 29 will generate $735 million per year in total revenue. This money will be used to fund life-saving research on cancer and other tobacco-related diseases, and to support smoking cessation and prevention programs. To assure these resources are invested responsibly, the proposition will create a nine-member Citizen's Oversight Committee made up of scientists, doctors and cancer survivors.
Prop 29 Supports Life-Saving Medical Research
Opponents of Prop 29 (namely Big Tobacco) call it "wasteful spending." We are certain that the one in two Californians who will be diagnosed with cancer at some point in their lives would disagree. Passing Prop 29 will allow California's world-renowned universities, research institutes, biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies, medical doctors and advocacy groups like the American Cancer Society and the American Heart Association to accelerate the fight against cancer and other smoking-related diseases. Cancer and heart disease are the leading causes of death in California.
We are in the midst of a transformative decade in cancer research and in translating our research advances to patient benefit. Researchers around the state will use revenue from Prop 29 to unlock the secrets of how cancer develops and spreads, so we can design better diagnostics and therapeutics. Prop 29 will help us detect cancer earlier, treat tumors more effectively and ultimately save more lives.
Prop 29 Stimulates California's Economy
In addition to saving lives and lowering health care costs, passage of Prop 29 will help stimulate the state's economy by creating and saving jobs in California. The biotechnology industry has been a shining example of stability and growth in our state over the past several decades, and is an area we should be turning to now to help our state recover from economic decline.
Today, California is home to several of the most vibrant life-science research clusters in the world, including 10 of the country's 66 NCI-designated cancer centers (more than any other state in the nation). The San Francisco Bay Area boasts the oldest and largest biomedical cluster in California and is a world leader in biotechnology. San Diego is known for its biopharmaceutical and medical diagnostics companies, while Orange County has a reputation for medical device inventions and Los Angeles is the place for cutting-edge cancer research and patient care.
As of 2009, the biotechnology industry employed nearly 270,000 Californians. And that number jumps to more than 783,000 jobs when we include everyone employed in academic research, bio-pharmaceuticals, diagnostics, medical devices, laboratory services and other supporting industries.
Yet, global financial woes and diminishing support from the federal government -- the National Institutes of Health in particular -- will negatively impact California's biomedical industry for years to come. Passage of Prop 29 would be instrumental in further enhancing our state as a global leader in biomedicine, in enhancing our ability to retain and create jobs in the biotechnology industry, and in fully delivering on the promise of bringing new live-saving strategies to the patients who need them.
The choice is simple. Prop 29, the California Cancer Research Act, will benefit every Californian by lowering health care costs in the state, by enhancing California's economy, and by funding life-saving research that produces new diagnostics, treatments and cures for patients.
Hollye Jacobs, RN, MS, MSW To read more about Hollye's holistic and humorous journey over, around, above and below breast cancer, please visit her blog, The Silver Pen (http://www.thesilverpen.com/). You may email her at hollye@TheSilverPen or follow her on Twitter @hollyejacobs.
Sherry Lansing is chairman of the University of California Board of Regents and former chairman and CEO of Paramount Pictures Motion Picture Group. She also founded The Sherry Lansing Foundation and co-founded Stand Up to Cancer (SU2C), a charitable program of the Entertainment Industry Foundation (EIF) that raises funds to accelerate the pace of groundbreaking translational research that will get new therapies to patients quickly.
Kristiina Vuori, M.D., Ph.D. is the president of Sanford-Burnham Medical Research Institute in La Jolla, Calif. and director of Sanford-Burnham's National Cancer Institute-designated Cancer Center. She is also a member of the Stand Up to Cancer/Melanoma Research Alliance Dream Team and sits on the Board of Directors of the American Association for Cancer Research.
Follow Hollye Harrington Jacobs on Twitter: www.twitter.com/hollyejacobs
Wendell Potter: Putting Our Premiums Into Medical Care, Not Profits
Question what is the national funding for the Federal National Cancer Institute funded by our Federal tax Dollars?
Summary
Funds available to the NCI in FY 2010 totaled over $5.098 billion, reflecting an increase of 2.6% and $131 million from the previous fiscal year. Fiscal highlights from FY 2010 include: Source http://obf.cancer.gov/financial/factbook.htm Now consider this. The America Cancer Society brags about lobbying for the National Cancer Institute ( Source ACS Tax Returns) in return the American Cancer Society gets millions of tax dollars from the NCI! No wonder they can spend “Major funding in support of Proposition 29 came from the American Cancer Society ($8.47 million)”
I bet this wasn't being told to the California voters!
You complain about Tobacco Companies? Try the so called non profit the American Cancer Society, Calif. Div. (Proposition 86) that reported spending $4,738.00 in grass roots lobbying to the IRS when in one check they spent $637,000.00 which was above their non profit tax exempt status. Source American Cancer Society group tax return 990 and the Calif. Secretary of State data base! Check out the California Hospital Health Services that spent $11,000,000.00 on Proposition 86 their Federal Tax 990 Tax Return would make that impossible! I have those tax returns as well.
So can't we all just get along and stop ostracizing me for being a smoker!
Robert Wood Johnson Foundation aka Johnson and Johnson profits from attacking smoking.
But don't think the problem with smoking is that people die too young, the problem is that smokers can live too long with the horrible effects from cancer, heart disease, stroke, COPD and a wide variety of other smoking related diseases. Smoking murders 50% of it's long time users but the reality is that NO ONE who smokes is healthy. Anything we can do to reduce the death, disability and destruction caused by smoking is reason enough to vote YES on Prop. 29.
www.StopSmokingStayQuit.blogspot.com
Tobacco use accounts for 30% of all Cancer Deaths, according to The American Cancer Society and The State of California. Please see Adobe Reader Page 3 of 40:
http://www.ccrcal.org/pdf/Reports/ACS_2012.pdf
16,397 tobacco-related cancer deaths indicate a death rate of One Third of One Percent of the smokers. But I know, "30% of Cancer Deaths" sounds like "Much Larger Numbers".
And COPD appears to affect 4.5% of lifetime smokers, has a theory of Genetic causes among specific smokers (dual genetic defect), and appears to have an association with lung cancer, at least going by my memory of the issue of Asbestos as a cause of COPD and Lung Cancer. If COPD is Always a precursor of lung cancer, would you freely admit it to the public? Or hold the fact as "proprietary knowledge"?
The ACS is a Non-Profit Organization with Current revenues of between $1.2 and $3.4 BILLION Dollars per year. Please see cancer.org, the Official website of The American Cancer Society, at the bottom of this page:
http://www.cancer.org/MyACS/Eastern/AreaHighlights/ny-tobacco-tax-evasion-fact-sheet
"As the nation’s largest non-governmental investor in cancer research, contributing about $3.4 billion, we turn what we know about cancer into what we do."
You indicate being in the Tobacco Control business. Does Proposition 29 represent potential personal income to you?
No.
I lost my father to lung cancer. I know the effects of a lifetime of smoking. But this bill isn't the solution.
Thanks for your thoughts on Prop. 29. We posted it to the Editorials section of MapLight Voter Guide's Prop. 29 page.
We've run the numbers from the Secretary of State site and as of 4/22 there has been $4.6M raised For Prop 29 vs. $23.8M raised Against (http://maplight.org/california/proposition/2012/june/prop-29).
More funding data, endorsements, news stories, and editorials for California Propositions can be found here, maplight.org/voter or here,http://es.maplight.org/votante.
Thanks!
The Folks at MapLight
I am Your Neighbor...
In the report, "California Cancer Facts for 2012" provided by The American Cancer Society
http://www.ccrcal.org/pdf/Reports/ACS_2012.pdf
"How many people will die?
In 2012, nearly 55,415 people will die of the disease..."
"Could more people be saved?
...The American Cancer Society estimates that more.
than 16,397 lives will be lost to cancer in California because.
of tobacco use."
12% of Californians smoke.
At a State Population of more than 37 million people, that is approximately 4.4 Million California Smokers.
16,397 tobacco-related cancer deaths indicate a death rate of One Third of One Percent of the smokers.
And 55,415 deaths indicates TWICE AS MANY Non-Tobacco cancer deaths than that of the smokers, so who is really running up the cost to the State? And wouldn't the Non-Tobacco cancers then be Twice the cost to the State than the $9 Billion being blamed on the smokers?
Isn't the $9 Billion Dollar cost to the State the result of what the medical profession charges for their services?
Why is that the fault of The Smokers?
14 years ago I could buy a carton of cigarettes for $17.50.
After The ACS came to California,
I now pay over $50 a carton.
There are Twice as Many Non-Tobacco Cancer Deaths.
The American Cancer Society REFUSES TO TAX THEMSELVES TO FIND 'THE CURE'.
Thank you for asking...me.
Of course there are other types of Cancer (I am recovering from breast Cancer) and added together they may be higher in number than lung Cancer; however, since we know tobacco smoke causes lung Cancer, why would anyone want to keep adding to tobacco's profits on the lungs of so many people?
Tobacco use is an addiction, and most of us are aware that unless a substance abuser wishes to recover, they will most often fight to keep their substance. That does not change facts.
According to Wikipedia: Health Effects of Tobacco: Cancer:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_effects_of_tobacco#Cancer
"The risk of dying from lung cancer before age 85 is 22.1% for a male smoker and 11.9% for a female smoker, in the absence of competing causes of death."
Remember, the term "risk" is Not the same as the term "Probability".
This is a perverse way of saying that 77.9% of the people who smoke tobacco Do Not Develop lung cancer by the age of 85.
The chart from the original smoking-related lung cancer study still only indicates a rate of roughly 200 deaths per 100,000 smokers, or One Fifth of One Percent of the smokers per year.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Cancer_smoking_lung_cancer_correlation_from_NIH.svg
I believe the Wikipedia page is maintained by those Organizations who are concerned about Smoking. In fact there is a Politically-Motivated entry for Prop 29 without any overview or counterpoints.
In fact, the article is nothing but an advertisement for the Yes on 29 campaign.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Cancer_Research_Act
Instead of blaming smokers for the 22.1% lung cancer rate, The ACS should start finding out why 77.9% of us who smoke Do Not Develop lung cancer by the age of 85.
That is how you find The Cure.
Problem is, they're taxing people out of smoking, which means that as a source of funding it's about to implode. Which'll screw over the social programs (like schools) that have come to rely on that money...
Ney Riddle is imply using obfuscatory rhetorical tactics in order to diverge our attention away from the fact that tobacco use is the #1 cause of preventable disease, which includes lung cancer, emphysema, chronic bronchitis, and heart disease.
Here is a better way to look at the data for the CDC:
1. Nearly one in five U.S. adults (45.3 million) are current cigarette smokers.
2. Of the 19.3% of American adults who smoke, about half will die prematurely from smoking-related causes.
3. On average, adults who smoke cigarettes die 14 years earlier than nonsmokers.
4. Men who smoke increase their risk of dying from lung cancer by more than 22 times.
5. Smoking triples middle-aged men's risk of dying from heart disease.
The bottom line is that smoking increases the risk of cancer and heart disease substantially, leading to premature deaths.