This month, ClearWay Minnesota launched a new campaign to shed light on the hidden harms of tobacco addiction. The campaign highlights teen tobacco use, the smoking-related costs borne by all Minnesotans, and Big Tobacco’s youth-focused marketing tactics – all under the theme of See What You’ve Been Missing.

“The tobacco industry is still causing tremendous harm, but it’s more hidden from view than it used to be,” said Michael Sheldon, ClearWay Minnesota’s Director of Marketing. “Through this campaign, ClearWay Minnesota hopes to bring attention to how the tobacco industry targets our youth and costs all of us money, even Minnesotans who don’t smoke.”

While Minnesota has made significant progress in the last two decades to reduce tobacco’s harm, tobacco use remains the leading cause of preventable death and disease. New tobacco products also threaten to disrupt efforts to reduce youth smoking. For the first time in 17 years, the rate of youth tobacco use rose in Minnesota in 2017, due to large increases in teens using e-cigarettes and flavored tobacco products.

The See What You’ve Been Missing campaign began as the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced new proposals to curb youth e-cigarette addiction, which the agency calls an epidemic. Through powerful ads, See What You’ve Been Missing calls attention to rising youth tobacco rates and to the dangers of e-cigarettes and flavored tobacco products.

The campaign website, MissingItMN.org, includes helpful information for parents and adults about e-cigarettes and what the latest products look like, signs a child might be vaping, a smoking-related cost calculator and information on tobacco industry marketing. The campaign launched November 12 and includes TV, radio, digital and out-of-home advertising, paid social and search, and an interactive website. The campaign will run through late 2019. Haberman is the creative partner for the campaign.

“In the face of rising health care costs and the new threat of youth e-cigarette use, Minnesotans need to re-commit to making tobacco prevention a public health priority,” Sheldon added. “Big Tobacco is still up to their old tricks, but is using new tactics. We hope highlighting the tobacco industry’s addictive and costly schemes will bring urgency to the tobacco issues we face, so Minnesotans will take action to prevent a generation of youth nicotine addiction.”

You can view the new ads below.

Vaping School from ClearWay Minnesota on Vimeo.

Price Check from ClearWay Minnesota on Vimeo.

 

ClearWay Minnesota is proud to release our 2018 Annual Report, commemorating 20 years of our work to reduce tobacco’s harm in Minnesota. The report highlights our history of activities in areas of cessation, marketing and communications, research, public affairs, and community development. These highlights include:

• Results of two decades of tobacco control work in Minnesota, including smoking declines, lives and money saved, and Minnesotans making their homes smoke-free;
• 175,000 Minnesota tobacco users getting free help to quit through QUITPLAN Services;
• Award-winning advertising campaigns;
• $32 million in research grants and contracts given to Minnesota researchers;
• Policies to protect youth from the tobacco industry passed at the state and local levels;
• Partnerships with American Indian Nations and diverse communities; and
• Reflections from our outgoing Board Chair.

Also included are a list of Board Members since our inception and statements of our financial position and activities for Fiscal Year 2018.

20th Anniversary Annual Report

This week, ClearWay Minnesota’s Board of Directors will celebrate our nonprofit tobacco control organization’s 20^th anniversary. Founded with the state’s tobacco settlement, we have spent the past 20 years using proven science and innovative programs to reduce the burden caused by smoking and nicotine addiction in our state.

“The dramatic decrease in smoking in recent decades is one of the greatest public health accomplishments in Minnesota history,” said Laurie Lafontaine, ClearWay Minnesota’s Board Chair. “ClearWay Minnesota has been at the center of a movement to help smokers quit and stop kids from ever starting.”

Today, smoking rates among Minnesota adults and youth are at all-time lows. The anniversary also follows a new study showing other results of our work since the settlement. Conducted by HealthPartners Institute, the study found activities by ClearWay Minnesota and other health organizations have prevented thousands of Minnesota deaths, prevented tens of thousands of hospitalizations from smoking-related diseases, and saved more than $5 billion in excess health care costs and lost worker productivity.

Founded in 1998, ClearWay Minnesota was created with 3 percent ($202 million) of the settlement Minnesota received from the cigarette companies following a long legal battle. National and state leaders and health experts, including Surgeon General Dr. C. Everett Koop, FDA Commissioner Dr. David Kessler, Minnesota Attorney General Skip Humphrey and Mayo Clinic’s Dr. Richard Hurt, helped create a plan to administer ClearWay Minnesota as an independent nonprofit with a 25-year lifespan.

Over the course of the past two decades, we have grown to be among the most comprehensive tobacco control organizations in the country. Its work encompasses cessation, marketing and communications, research, public affairs and community development activities.

Highlights of ClearWay Minnesota’s work include:

• QUITPLAN® Services, a free, cutting-edge program that’s given quitting help to 175,000 Minnesotans;
• Leadership of a health coalition that’s helped pass major local and statewide policies like Tobacco 21, flavored tobacco restrictions, cigarette price increases and the Freedom to Breathe Act;
• $30 million in grants given to scientists studying tobacco issues and exploring new ways to eliminate its harms;
• Innovative research projects like the Minnesota Adult Tobacco Survey, the best source of data about smoking and tobacco use in the state;
• Investments in the communities most affected by smoking’s harms, such as partnerships with tribes working to restore traditional tobacco practices and reduce commercial tobacco abuse; and
• Major advertising campaigns that have educated about tobacco’s harms and encouraged Minnesota smokers to seek quitting help.

“These accomplishments show what happens when proven strategies are applied to a critical health issue like smoking,” said David Willoughby, ClearWay Minnesota’s Chief Executive Officer since 2000. “QUITPLAN Services are scheduled to end in 2020, with ClearWay Minnesota closing our doors a few years later. With the tobacco industry mastering new ways to attract kids and addict them to nicotine, the stakes couldn’t be higher. Unless the state dedicates new funding to preventing and fighting nicotine addiction, the health of our state and the future of our kids will both suffer.”

He added, “Our elected officials must continue to make a difference in the lives of our people, helping them live longer and save money, both for themselves and taxpayers. The progress our state has made in reducing tobacco’s harm must continue.”

Minnesotans for a Smoke-Free Generation, a coalition of more than 60 organizations working to reduce youth tobacco use, today issued a statement on the news that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) may soon ban the sale of most flavored e-cigarette pods in gas stations and convenience stores.

Molly Moilanen, Director of Public Affairs at ClearWay Minnesota and Co-Chair of Minnesotans for a Smoke-Free Generation, said, “The FDA can and should use its full legal authority without delay in regulating tobacco products – especially in light of what they are rightly calling a youth e-cigarette epidemic.”

Moilanen continued, “We look forward to seeing the full details of the FDA’s plan and hope they will move quickly and decisively. Removing flavored e-cigarette pods, which are extremely popular among teens, from places youth frequent is a welcome first step toward curbing youth addiction. We also urge the FDA to take swift action to restrict menthol tobacco products, which would help reduce tobacco-related disparities.”

She added, “We urge policy-makers across Minnesota to lead the way with strong local and statewide policies that protect our youth from lifetime tobacco addiction – including raising the tobacco age to 21, restricting the sale of all flavored tobacco products, adding e-cigarettes to clean indoor air policies and investing in proven tobacco prevention and cessation programs.”

Background:

In addition to federal action, state and local governments can also combat commercial tobacco use. To date, 15 Minnesota cities have passed Tobacco 21 policies, nine have passed tobacco flavor restrictions and five have passed menthol restrictions.

The tobacco industry blatantly continues to use menthol, candy and fruit flavors to attract the next generation of smokers. In 2009, the FDA banned the use of most flavoring agents, except menthol, in cigarettes. However, that ban does not include other tobacco products such as little cigars and cigarillos, or emerging products like e-cigarettes. Internal documents from the tobacco industry show that tobacco companies know that young people are attracted to flavors in tobacco products. Research also has found that most kids start smoking by using flavored tobacco products.

Menthol tobacco flavoring makes it easier for kids to start smoking and harder for adults to quit. The tobacco industry has a long history of targeting youth, African Americans, women and LGBTQ communities with menthol tobacco marketing. Nationally, 88 percent of African American smokers smoke menthols, compared to 29 percent of white smokers.

Flavored tobacco products have helped contribute to the first increase in youth tobacco use in 17 years in Minnesota. The 2017 Minnesota Youth Tobacco Survey found that more than 60 percent of youth tobacco users reported using flavored products in the past 30 days, and almost 40 percent of Minnesota high-school students have tried e-cigarettes, which come in candy and other kid-friendly flavors.

Flavored products mask the harshness of tobacco, but are just as addictive and dangerous as other products. Nicotine damages the developing adolescent brain whether it’s delivered in a cigarette, cigarillo, e-cigarette or other tobacco product. In a recent health advisory, the Minnesota Department of Health called youth nicotine addiction a major health concern because it harms the adolescent brain and primes youth for addiction to cigarettes and other substances.

The Minnesota Legislature should take additional steps to reverse the alarming trend of youth tobacco use, such as increasing the tobacco age and restricting the sale of flavored tobacco products statewide. Since nearly all addicted tobacco users started before they turn 21, raising the tobacco sale age to 21 would curb addiction and keep tobacco products out of schools. Restricting the sale of kid-friendly flavored tobacco products to adult-only stores and including e-cigarettes in smoke-free air laws would also help curb the threat of youth addiction.

Finally, Minnesota should invest in robust tobacco cessation and prevention efforts that stop smoking before it starts. In 2017, Minnesota collected over $840 million in tobacco taxes and ongoing tobacco settlement payments. Less than 1 percent of these funds was spent on tobacco prevention, and none was dedicated to quit-smoking services.