Tobacco Control: Advocacy efforts from organized medicine

This session will review the AMA's 40 years of tobacco control activities and highlight the importance of the physician voice in advocating for policies that prevent and reduce tobacco use. The AMA has harnessed the power of the physician community to assist in changing policies on tobacco nationwide. It has policy encouraging physicians to screen and counsel patients on smoking. It partnered with the CDC to develop a recommendation for screening adolescents for smoking and an intervention to help teens quit. The AMA's state associations worked at the local level to increase cigarette taxes, restrict youth access, and prohibit smoking in workplaces and public places. With funding from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the AMA led the 10 year Smokeless States initiative by providing technical assistance and medical expertise to 43 state coalitions. These coalitions contributed to the development of smokefree laws and policies nationwide. The AMA has advocated for FDA authority over tobacco products and advertising to restrict youth exposure. This work served as a catalyst for the AMA's current co-sponsorship with the AHA, the Legacy Foundation, and the NY State Department of Health of ScreenOut, a national campaign to give an R rating to movies that depict actors smoking. Seventy-five percent of youth-rated movies show characters smoking, which increases the likelihood of youth smoking. To put pressure on the Motion Picture Association of America, the AMA launched a mass media and letter-writing initiative led by the AMA Alliance, a 26,000 member organization comprised of AMA member spouses.