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 On November 23, 1998, 46 states settled their lawsuits against the nation’s major tobacco companies to recover tobacco-related health care costs, joining four states — Mississippi, Texas, Florida and Minnesota — that had reached earlier, individual settlements.
These settlements require the tobacco companies to make annual payments to the states in perpetuity, with total payments estimated at $246 billion over the first 25 years.
The tobacco settlements presented the states with a historic opportunity and unprecedented sums of money to attack the enormous public health problem posed by tobacco use in the United States.
Ten years later, this report finds that most states have failed to keep their promise to spend a significant portion of the settlement funds on programs to protect kids from tobacco addiction and help smokers quit.
This report is issued by the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, American Heart Association, American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network, American Lung Association and Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.
| Interactive Map: State Funding for Tobacco Prevention | 
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States that are spending 50% or more of CDC recommendation on tobacco prevention programs. |
Click a state on the map above or select from the dropdown box to see state-specific settlement information: |  |
States that are spending 25% - 49% of CDC recommendation on tobacco prevention programs. |  |
States that are spending 10% - 24% of CDC recommendation on tobacco prevention programs. |  |
States that are spending less than 10% of CDC recommendation on tobacco prevention programs. |
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Key findings of this report include:
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Over the past 10 years, the states have received $203.5 billion in tobacco-generated revenue — $79.2 billion from the tobacco settlement and $124.3 billion from tobacco taxes. But they have spent only 3.2 percent of their tobacco money — $6.5 billion — on tobacco prevention and cessation programs.
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This year, no state is funding tobacco prevention programs at the levels recommended by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Only nine states are funding tobacco prevention at even half the CDC-recommended amount, and 27 states are providing less than a quarter of the recommended funding. (Beginning in fiscal 2010, North Dakota will fund its prevention program at the CDC-recommended level as a result of a state ballot initiative approved on November 4.) Get more information about the CDC's recommended amount.
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The limited restrictions on tobacco marketing imposed by the tobacco settlement have failed to curtail the tobacco industry’s ability to aggressively market its products. Annual tobacco marketing expenditures have increased by 94 percent, from $6.9 billion in 1998 to $13.4 billion in 2005, the most recent year for which the Federal Trade Commission has reported such data. The tobacco companies spend nearly $19 to market tobacco products for every $1 the states spend to prevent kids from smoking and help smokers quit.
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Total funding for state tobacco prevention programs this year is $718.1 million, including $670.9 million in state funds and $47.2 million in federal grants. This amounts to just 19.4 percent of the $3.7 billion the CDC recommends for the states combined.
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The states this year will collect $24.6 billion in revenue from the tobacco settlement and tobacco taxes, but will spend less than 3 percent of it on tobacco prevention programs. It would take just 15 percent of their tobacco money to fund tobacco prevention programs in every state at CDC-recommended levels.
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