RESEARCH PAPER

The California Tobacco Control Program’s effect on adult smokers: (3) Similar effects for African Americans across states

Dennis R Trinidad, Karen Messer, Elizabeth A Gilpin, Wael K Al-Delaimy, Martha M White, John P Pierce

Cancer Prevention and Control Program, Moores UCSD Cancer Center, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, California, USA

Correspondence to:
Correspondence to:
Dr J P Pierce
Cancer Prevention and Control Program, Moores UCSD Cancer Center, University of California, San Diego, 3855 Health Sciences Drive, 0901, La Jolla, California 92093–0901, USA; jppierce{at}ucsd.edu

Objective: To compare trends in African-American (AA) and non-Hispanic white (NHW) smoking between states categorised as having three different levels of tobacco control practice in the 1990s.

Setting and participants: Analysis of 1992–3 to 2001–2 Tobacco Use Supplements to the Current Population Survey for differences in adult (20–64 years) daily smoking prevalence for AAs and NHWs across states: California (CA; high cigarette price/comprehensive programme), New York (NY) and New Jersey (NJ; high cigarette price/no comprehensive programme), and tobacco growing states (TGS; low cigarette price/no comprehensive programme).

Results: From 1992–3 to 2001–2, there were large declines in AA smoking across states (2.7–3.8% decrease/year, adjusted for age, income, education, gender; p<0.05). Adjusted NHW smoking prevalence declined significantly only in CA. AA prevalence declined significantly and did not differ across state groups. In all years, in all state groups, adjusted prevalence was either not significantly different or was lower for AAs than for NHWs. More recent cohorts of AAs appeared to have taken up smoking at lower rates than older cohorts.

Conclusion: There were uniformly large declines in AA smoking from 1992–3 to 2001–2 across states, independent of type of tobacco control strategy. Further research is needed into factors associated with smoking declines among AAs.

Abbreviations: AA, African-American; CPS, Current Population Survey; NHW, non-Hispanic white; TGS, tobacco-growing states; TUS, Tobacco Use Supplements; TUS–CPS, Tobacco Use Supplements to the Current Population Survey

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