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Date: Monday, April 27, 1998 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact: Llelwyn Grant or Sylvia Rosas and CDC Office on Smoking and Health (202) 205-8500 or (770) 488-5493
"We are witnessing the first steps of a potentially tragic reversal for the health of American minorities," said Dr. David Satcher in releasing his first report as Surgeon General, and the 24th Surgeon General report to focus on tobacco use since 1964. "Where we once saw hopeful signs of declining lung cancer among minorities in the early years of this decade, we now see striking increases in smoking by minority youth. Unless we can reverse these trends, they are bound t o result in more lung disease and early death for these populations.
"We cannot sit by and let these disturbing trends occur unchallenged. We must call attention to this threat, and we must fight it," Dr. Satcher said.
"This new report clearly shows tobacco's increasing grip on racial and ethnic minorities -- the fastest growing segments of the American population," said HHS Secretary Donna E. Shalala. "This new report underscores the need for Co ngress to pass comprehensive tobacco legislation this year based on the President's five key principles that includes a significant price increase and a plan to dramatically reduce youth tobacco use."
Today's report surveys tobacco use and its health consequences among all four major U.S. racial and ethnic minority groups: African-American, American Indian/Alaska Native, Asian American/Pacific Islander, and Hispanic. According to the report, c igarette smoking is a major cause of death and disease in all four groups. African-American men bear one of the greatest health burdens of the four ethnic groups, with death rates from lung cancer that are 50 percent higher than those of white men.
Dr. Satcher noted that the four groups studied by his new report make up about one-fourth of the U.S. population and are growing rapidly. By the year 2050, members of these racial/ethnic minority groups will comprise close to one-half of the Unit ed States population.
"This report sounds an urgent alarm," said Dr. Satcher. "We must use every tool at our disposal to reduce tobacco use among racial and ethnic minorities -- especially among adolescents -- and to reverse these frightening trends.&qu ot;
From 1990-1995, death rates from respiratory cancers declined substantially among African-American men, declined to a lesser extent among Hispanic men and women, and leveled off among African-American women. Death rates increased only among Ameri can Indians/Alaska Natives -- the only group for which smoking rates increased during this period.
In recent years, however, tobacco use among adolescents from racial and ethnic minority groups has begun to increase rapidly, threatening to reverse the progress made against lung cancer among adults in these minority groups. Though their rates r emain considerably lower than those of whites, cigarette smoking among African-American and Hispanic adolescents has increased in the 1990s after several years of substantial declines among adolescents of the major racial and ethnic groups. This increase is particularly striking among African-American youths, who had the greatest decline of the four groups during the 1970s and 1980s, but the steepest increase in use in the 1990s. Cigarette smoking among African-American teens has increased 80 percent ov er the last six years -- three times as fast as among white teens.
"Unless they are reversed, these increases in tobacco use are a time-bomb for the health of our minority populations," Dr. Satcher said. "If tobacco use continues to increase among minority adolescents, we can expect severe health consequences to begin to be felt in the early part of the next century."
In releasing the new report, Dr. Satcher also emphasized the implications of increased tobacco use on children's health.
"Not only does tobacco shorten the lives of kids who start smoking, but babies and children who are exposed to tobacco smoke have more ear infections, asthma, and a higher incidence of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. Mothers who smoke during p regnancy are more likely to have a low birthweight baby and put their babies at increased risk of SIDS," emphasized Dr. Satcher.
The Surgeon General's report notes that prevalence of tobacco varies among and within racial and ethnic groups. For example, American Indians/Alaska Natives have the highest rates of tobacco use, and African-American and Southeast Asian men also have a high prevalence of smoking. Asian American women and Hispanic women have the lowest levels of smoking. The report also shows that, in general, smoking rates among Mexican-American adults increase as they learn and adopt the values, beliefs, and n orms of American culture.
According to the report, more prevention research is needed to understand patterns of tobacco use and factors that affect tobacco use. Questions also remain about differences in tobacco-related disease and death rates among racial/ethnic minority groups.
A detailed summary of the Surgeon General's report, "Tobacco Use Among U.S. Racial/Ethnic Minority Groups," and other related information can be found on CDC's web site (www.cdc.gov/ tobacco). Copies of the Executive Summary and report "At-a-Glance" can also be ordered via fax by calling 1-800-CDC-1311 or writing CDC's Office on Smoking and Health, Mail Stop K-50, 4770 Buford Highway, Atlanta, Georgia 30341.