Tobacco affects us all, whether it's personally, professionally or financially, and there are numbers to prove it. Smoking kills more people than alcohol, AIDS, car crashes, illegal drugs, murders and suicides combined. Here are some other startling statistics on the health and financial implications of tobacco:
Health Cost of Tobacco Use in Iowa
- 19.8% of Iowa adults are smokers
- 18.9% of Iowa high school students are smokers
- 231,000 kids are exposed to secondhand smoke at home
- 7.5 million packs of cigarettes are bought or smoked by kids in Iowa each year
- 4,400 adults die each year in Iowa from their own smoking
- 480 adult nonsmokers die each year from exposure to secondhand smoke
Financial Cost of Tobacco Use in Iowa
- Annual health care costs in Iowa directly caused by tobacco use: $1 billion
- Annual health care expenditures in Iowa from secondhand smoke exposure: $49.2 million
- Iowans' state/federal taxes used to cover smoking-caused government costs: $725.7 million, or $598 per household
- Total spent by tobacco industry marketing in Iowa each year: $176 million
- Iowa spending on tobacco prevention each year: $10.4 million
Source: Campaign for Tobacco-free Kids
