ANN ARBOR—This year, one million American teen-agers will become smokers. More than one in four of these new smokers will someday die from tobacco-related causes. By a wide margin, tobacco is the most serious threat to the lives and health of American teen-agers.

“Combating Teen Smoking: Research and Policy Strategies,” a new book due out in June, offers findings demonstrating anti-smoking programs can prevent young people from starting to smoke or get them to stop smoking, thus sparing them the wide-ranging health effects associated with the habit.

“Combating Teen Smoking” is written as a guide for policy-makers and communities on the front lines of preventing youth smoking. It compiles what is known about adolescents and tobacco use, and highlights areas where additional research is needed.

“Smoking is the leading—and entirely preventable—cause of premature mortality and morbidity in this country,” said lead author Peter Jacobson, associate professor of health management at the University of Michigan. “As evidence accumulates that good programs can reduce tobacco use, the government should not remain neutral.”

The authors recommend various ways to help slow, or even reverse, the recent rise in teen-age smoking. Proven methods that states and communities might use include initiating anti-smoking media campaigns based on social marketing principles, raising the price of cigarettes, using computers to develop individualized smoking prevention programs, and increasing investment in smoking cessation programs for both children and adults, Jacobson said.

The book makes a case for mounting a serious and comprehensive campaign to discourage youth tobacco use, strongly advocating that states and communities devote significant tobacco settlement resources to expanding, improving, and evaluating comprehensive tobacco prevention and control activities.

“States and communities should fund many diverse interventions, including new innovations and programs, that may help reduce teen smoking,” Jacobson said. “For example, a balanced program that deals with both adults and adolescents is likely to be more sustainable and more effective than one targeted primarily at either adults or adolescents.

“We still have a lot to learn about teen tobacco use, including the role of genetic factors affecting smoking cessation and the factors influencing teens to move from trying tobacco to becoming addicted. But we know enough about peer and parental influences and how higher prices reduce teen smoking, to support aggressive anti-tobacco programs,” Jacobson said.

Authors of the book include Jacobson; Paula Lantz, assistant professor; Harold Pollack, assistant professor; and Kenneth Warner, the Richard D. Remington Collegiate Professor and director of the U-M Tobacco Research Network, all at the U-M School of Public Health. Jeffrey Wasserman, consultant at the RAND Corporation, and Alexis Ahlstrom, an analyst at the Congressional Budget Office, are also authors.

The U-M Tobacco Research Network aims to increase the quality and utility of research on tobacco and nicotine. For more information: http://www.umich.edu/~umtrn/about.html.

“Combating Teen Smoking” is available through the University of Michigan Press http://www.press.umich.edu/.

Peter JacobsonPaula Lantzhttp://www.umich.edu/~umtrn/about.htmlhttp://www.press.umich.edu/