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 Legacy Unveils New Name and Logo, Reflecting National Interest in Preventive Care
 As the foundation celebrates its ten-year anniversary, there is a keen national interest in healthcare, including the importance of preventive care. With that in mind, we have unveiled a new name and logo to emphasize the foundation's role as a leading public health organization. While legally remaining the American Legacy Foundation, we will now use the shortened name "Legacy" for our daily operations, for which we've primarily been known in the marketplace and among key stakeholders for several years. The new logo includes a new tagline "For Longer Healthier Lives," which highlights our public-health focus and clarifies the outcome of the tobacco control work Legacy conducts. We continue to focus on tobacco control and prevention, and our mission remains the same: "Building a world where young people reject tobacco and anyone can quit." By giving young people the facts and information they need to reject tobacco and by providing adult smokers with the tools they need to quit and stay quit, Legacy is helping people live longer, healthier lives. This concept is now visually represented with the "rippling circles" icon in the new logo. We have long said that a legacy is not something you leave behind when you die. It is something you build every day that you live. As we move into our second decade, the updated name, logo and tagline will help us to emphasize our role as a leader in this critical area of public health. As part of the new look, Legacy will unveil an updated Web site: www.legacyforhealth.org. Twitter users can also follow Legacy at www.twitter.com/legacyforhealth to receive news and research updates as well as positive tips for promoting longer, healthier lives as it relates to tobacco. |
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November Marks Lung Cancer Awareness Month
 November marks Lung Cancer Awareness Month, a time to reflect on the personal and public toll lung cancer takes on families and communities across the nation. Each year, lung cancer claims more than 125,000 lives, and it happens to be the number-one cancer killer in women. One brave woman partnered with Legacy this month to take her personal struggle with this disease to the media in order to raise awareness of this important issue. (Read more about her story here.) It is widely known that cigarette smoking causes most cases (nearly 90 percent) of lung cancer, though other possible causes include radon, asbestos, and pollution. In addition, it is estimated that the direct medical cost for lung cancer treatment is nearly $5 billion each year. This month not only provides a platform to call for more funding for treatment and research, it is an opportunity to urge smokers and their loves ones assess the quit smoking tools and resources available to them, including through the foundation's free quit support campaign, EX®, which is supported by the National Alliance for Tobacco Cessation. This month, EX rolls out with new television ads that are appearing on cable networks nationwide. (Learn more about EX here.)
We look forward to working with you this month and beyond on this important issue. Below are some resources on Lung Cancer that we hope you will find useful: Back To Top |
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"Desperate Housewives" Actress and Lung Cancer Survivor Shares her Story
 Kathryn Joosten - a two-time Emmy winner - is best known for her current role as crotchety neighbor Mrs. McClusky on the hit ABC series Desperate Housewives. Joosten quit smoking - an addiction she battled for 45 years - when she was first diagnosed with lung cancer in 2001. In September, she announced her second bout of cancer and she underwent surgery in early October. Confident about her prognosis, she has vowed to continue to with her filming schedule and with speaking engagements across the country regarding this issue. "The stigma from lung cancer must be removed. The perception of lung cancer is like AIDS was in the 80's - people blamed others with lung cancer for doing it to themselves," said Joosten. "No matter how you got this disease, no one deserves lung cancer." Fox recently aired a special interview with Joosten and Legacy President and CEO Cheryl G. Healton, DrPH, on Fox's "Ask Dr. Manny" just in time for the Great American Smokeout.
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New EX Ads Launch to Help Smokers Relearn Life Without Cigarettes This month EX, the national campaign designed to help smokers create their own quit plan, debuts the second phase of advertising and promotions designed to help smokers "re-learn" life without cigarettes. For this installment of the campaign, EX helps smokers understand when and why they smoke each cigarette, so that they can break down their quit attempt into manageable pieces. As part of the preparation for quitting smoking, EX teaches smokers how to break the "glue" that holds each cigarette to its "trigger," so that when they do actually stop smoking, they will be better prepared and more confident in their ability to quit successfully.
 One television spot, "Spin," brings attention to the fact that many smokers light up when they drive. The ad features a man leaving his store for a smoke break. Cigarette in hand, he tries the doors of a few cars, before jumping into an idling delivery van and driving off. The voice over relates: "You don't drive every time you smoke; yet, you smoke every time you drive."
"Receptionist" is a look at the habit many people have of smoking while drinking alcohol. Cigarettes at the ready, a woman at her desk in an office setting crushes ice, chops strawberries and then blends the mixture while her coworkers all try to work. As she heads outside with her margarita, the voice over explains "You don't drink every time you smoke; yet, you smoke every time you drink."
Both ads direct viewers to BecomeAnEx.org to "relearn" life without cigarettes.
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Kentucky Joins the National Effort to Help Smokers Re-learn Life Without Cigarettes
 On, October 26th, Gov. Steve Beshear announced that Kentucky has become a member of the National Alliance for Tobacco Cessation (NATC), a public health coalition of national organizations and state health agencies that sponsors the EX campaign. The Kentucky Tobacco Cessation Program in the Cabinet for Health and Family Services (CHFS) hopes to reduce the number of adult smokers by linking Kentuckians with the EX campaign's online and informational resources, providing direct assistance to help more than 807,000 Kentuckians to finally quit. This new public education effort will encourage the 25 percent of Kentucky adults who smoke to approach quitting smoking as "re-learning life without cigarettes." As noted by Cheryl G. Healton, DrPH, president and CEO of Legacy, "It is an historic day when one of the nation's top tobacco producing states, with extremely high smoking rates, joins the national effort to help smokers quit." Click here to listen to an MP3 from the press conference.
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"Do You Have What it Takes" to Keep Up with truth®?
 Legacy's award-winning truth® campaign hasn't slowed down in counter-marketing the tobacco industry with its thought provoking installment "Do You Have What It Takes." With fresh new games, video spots, and television integrations, the ad campaign shows yet another side of the tobacco industry by asking real-life job-seekers whether they would be willing to participate in the types of decisions and situations that tobacco industry executives have made or encountered. More new elements of this ongoing campaign include:
- Games: Visit thetruth.com to play Addictor Click, which requires players to match up three supposed "addictive items", as labeled by tobacco executives as equal to the addictiveness of tobacco. Type or Die, a game that challenges players to type a sentence in 6.5 seconds or less, marking the amount of time a person is killed by tobacco related death, can be found at typeordiegame.com.
- Video: New ad spots depicting a mock recruiter interviewing real people will air in cinemas and seven states throughout the months of October through December. To see the ads, visit thetruth.com or You Tube.
- TV Integration: Teen nick & the G4 network will work with truth® this fall in creating cross promotional avenues involving the new campaign. Micro-episodes of Degrassi will air online featuring the characters of the show wearing truth® clothing gear. The G4 network will work with the new Type or Die game as it's presented for an "Indie games" segment directing "gamers" to the truth® Web site to see if they "have what it takes".
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Legacy Calls for Action in Reducing Adult Smoking in Response to CDC Smoking Rates Report
The CDC's Nov. 12, 2009 Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report indicated that 20.6 percent (46 million) of adults in the United States were smokers in 2008, up from 19.8 percent in 2007. Following last month's alarming reports from the Institute of Medicine and the American Association of Pediatricians on secondhand smoke, this report comes at a critical time as November marks both Lung Cancer Awareness Month and the Great American Smoke Out. After years of decline, this recent plateau in adult smoking rates underscores the fact that complacency is the enemy in the battle against tobacco use. The national health objective for 2010 is to have 12 percent adult smoking rate - a goal that is looking even less likely with this latest increase. Struggles with job loss, health care costs, and financial downturn are just some of the triggers for American smokers. According to a Legacy survey released this time last year, a greater percentage of stressed smokers with a household income of less than $35k reported smoking more cigarettes per day (38 percent) due to the current state of the economy, compared to those with household incomes of $35-74k (24 percent) and those with incomes of more than $75k (13 percent). As we approach 2010, we must act quickly to save more lives from the effects of tobacco-related diseases.
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Court Rejects Tobacco Companies' Efforts to Preliminarily Enjoin New Rules Regarding Modified Risk Tobacco Products
In a victory for public health, a federal judge in Kentucky rejected a motion by tobacco companies to block key provisions of the new law giving the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) the power to regulate tobacco products. The suit, filed by Lorillard and R.J. Reynolds as well as several smaller companies, challenges the constitutionality of a number of provisions in the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act which deal with the advertising, marketing and labeling of tobacco products. Specifically, the court's decision supports the government's authority to prevent the industry from claiming that certain tobacco products carry reduced risks without prior FDA approval. U.S. District Court Judge Joseph H. McKinley denied a request from R.J. Reynolds and other tobacco companies to keep the FDA from implementing this part of the law, saying they have "little likelihood" in proving that their free speech rights have been harmed. The case will now proceed to a consideration of the other issues, which have been raised. Legacy joined a friend of the court brief in support of the government opposing the industry preliminary injunction notion. It was signed by eleven public-health organizations.
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New report: States Give $830 Million in Public Subsidies to the Type of Films that Play a Major Role in Recruiting Teen Smokers in United States
A new report shows that money that states offer to attract film productions actually go to the type of films blamed for recruiting half of new teen smokers. This just-released report from the University of California, San Francisco documents that, in 2008, the states handed out $500 million to help make top-grossing youth-rated films with smoking, while another $330 million in subsidies went to R-rated films with tobacco. This is in spite of the fact that published, peer-reviewed research, endorsed by the National Cancer InstituteI and other major public-health organizations, confirms that smoking in the movies is a powerful recruiter of youth smokers. The $830 million total surpasses the $719 million that all states spent on tobacco prevention programs in 2009. Legacy's President and CEO, Cheryl G. Healton said that taxpayers - parents and other adults - should not subsidize movies that can lead kids to start smoking. She urged state governments to pay attention to this report and leverage their bargaining power to address this serious issue. To read the report, click here.
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Emerging Tobacco Issues Webinar Available Online 
While there are 43 million Americans who smoke cigarettes, there are new tobacco-related products and other disturbing smoking devices that may be gaining popularity. Through a collaboration between Legacy and National Association of Local Boards of Health (NALBOH), Legacy recently offered a Webinar entitled: "Emerging Tobacco Products: "New Products, Same Targets," focusing on products like little cigars, cigarillos, snus and snuff, dissolvables, hookahs, new cigarettes and e-cigarettes. The presentation covered an overview of each product and available prevalence data, while touching on brand preferences, marketing strategies as well as brand promotion to give the audience a comprehensive outlook on these issues. Most importantly, participants were given calls to action to combat these threats to public health, including: calling public forums, responding to research gaps and educating youth advocates and the community. This presentation was given by Amber Thornton-Bullock, Executive Vice President of Program Development and Jennifer Cullen, PhD, Director of Research and Evaluation at Legacy. For more information on the Webinar, email Rebecca Carle at rcarle@legacyforhealth.org, or click here to view the PowerPoint presentation. Fact sheets on little cigars and e-cigarettes can be found on our Web site at legacyforhealth.org. |
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A Reminder about Smoking and Flu this Flu Season
Can quitting smoking help fight swine flu? According to the CDC, smoking can weaken your immune system, making you more susceptible to infections such as the flu. Some research has shown an increase in influenza among smokers, compared to nonsmokers, and a higher mortality rate from influenza for smokers than nonsmokers. As the country and the world increasingly experience the toll of Swine Flu every day, it could give the public health community an opportunity to send a new and immediate message: quit smoking. While smokers may know why they should quit due to tobacco's deadly toll in the long run, they may not know the riskiness of exposure to flu they face as a smoker.
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Grantee Spotlight: Maine Students Create Innovative Short Films to Spread Anti-Tobacco Message 
Students in Western Maine are combining creative thinking and the power of new media to tackle a not-so-new problem: youth smoking. CUT the Habit is a student-led film project devoted to spreading anti-tobacco messages. Organized by the Healthy Community Coalition and funded by Legacy, the program has shown promising results in its first year in raising awareness about the harms of smoking, and thus keeping teens from starting to smoke. Through short films, CUT the Habit aims to highlight the harmful effects of tobacco and showcase the truth about the tobacco industry and how it uses media and other methods to influence teens to smoke. Young people between the ages of 13 to 18 work in small teams writing, producing and editing 3-5 minute short films with innovative anti-tobacco messages - films that they then share with their peers. The finished films are posted at cutthehabit.org, where other young people can vote on their favorite films and leave comments.
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A Call for Youth Activism in Tobacco Control: Deadline Nov. 30
Applications are now being accepted for the Legacy Youth Activism Fellowship, which encourages young adults ages 18-24 to come up with innovative and fresh ideas to highlight youth smoking prevention for the 2010-2011 term. The 18- month program allows youth from a variety of communities and backgrounds to come together through meeting, events, and conferences to address the problems of tobacco control as a social justice issue. Participants will work individually and in groups to advocate for incentives designed to prevent youth smoking and support smokers in quitting by promoting awareness of the harmful effects of tobacco addiction. Interested students can access the application here or contact Amaka Obidegwu at (202) 454-5586. All applications must be submitted by November 30, 2009.
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Team Legacy Runs for Longer, Healthier Lives
 On Nov. 1, 2009, more than 35,000 athletes competed in the New York City ING Marathon. One runner, William Bachicha, chose to run for Team Legacy for the second time in three years, which meant raising at least $2,500 for the foundation and its mission to build a world where young people reject tobacco and anyone can quit. An avid runner for more than 20 years, he has had two family members who've lost their lives to tobacco-related diseases, so running for this cause has significant meaning for him personally. Additionally, as an endodontist, he has seen the effects tobacco can have on personal oral hygiene. "I run for Legacy because I believe in its cause to educate young people about the negative effects of tobacco in order to improve the quality and health of their lives," he said.
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Recognizing Native American Heritage Month 
November is also recognized as National American Indian and Alaska Native Heritage Month. With such a rich and revered heritage, it is alarming that American Indians not only generally begin smoking at an earlier age, but this group smokes more than any other racial population in the United States. We recognize that tobacco is a fairly prominent aspect of American Indian cultures, often used in religious and other ceremonies in healing and storytelling and it is considered a sacred gift of the earth to many American Indians. However, traditional or ceremonial use among this population does not resemble common cigarette smoking, which can result in tobacco-related disease and death, including cancer, which claims 18 percent of Native Americans each year. Health should be at the top of the list when celebrating this culture in November and beyond and Legacy is committed to reaching this population with the resources they need to live longer, healthier lives. Join Legacy in urging your Native American stakeholders to take advantage of free quit support provided by EX at BecomeAnEx.org.
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Grantee Spotlight: Respecting the Tobacco Way
 Respecting the Tobacco Way (RTW) is a grassroots social marketing campaign utilizing innovative media and education to reduce commercial tobacco use among American Indian (AI) youth 18 and under residing in Montana and Wyoming. From 1996 through 2000, the smoking rate among American Indians in the 12th grade was an estimated 46 percent -the highest among all youth groups. With funding from Legacy's truth® or Consequences Youth Tobacco Prevention Grants Program, RTW - based in Billings, MT - is addressing these disparities with an emphasis on culture and healthy lifestyles. The goal of the Respecting the Tobacco Way project is to reduce commercial tobacco use among AI youth in Montana and Wyoming by using several different tactics to reach American Indian youth that include building collaborative partnerships between RTW and Tribes, distributing program findings and key learnings to other Tribal areas to encourage similar efforts with youth from all Northern Plains Tribes and having Native youth develop culturally relevant media messages for their reservations. Respecting the Tobacco Way is a project run by the Rocky Mountain Tribal Epidemiology Center, a division of the Montana Wyoming Tribal Leaders Council. For more information about Respecting the Tobacco Way and its efforts, please contact Project Coordinator Dyani Bingham at 406-252-2550, or click here.
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Native Americans and Smoking Fact Sheet
For more information on prevalence and trends on Native Americans and smoking, visit legacyforhealth.org or click here.
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