Insecticides, tanning accelerators, lacquers and rat poisons are all poisons, and they are all found in cigarette smoke. Hundreds of thousands of Americans smoke daily while bearing this knowledge. Every year, that many people die from tobacco-related diseases. That is why the Partnership for a Healthy Mississippi is working to get students to quit smoking.
The Partnership has formed a coalition on campus with the help of a grant from the Mississippi attorney general’s office. As part of the College Initiative Project, MSU has partnered with seven other colleges in the state to promote a healthy Mississippi, said Thomas Bourgeois, associate dean of students who sponsors the program.
Bourgeois also said there will be a coalition meeting March 11 at 5:15 p.m. in the faculty lounge of The Union. Anyone is invited.
“If someone has input or wants to volunteer, they can,” Bourgeois said. “The more the merrier.”
Mary Macias, the project’s campus coordinator, said the goal of the program is to work with college students on prevention and cessation of smoking.
She explained that the project includes students, faculty and staff members who are trying to put together different initiatives to promote tobacco awareness.
“We are trying to work with different sports teams, start up programming in residence halls and in Greek organizations, and we’re trying to start right now,” Macias said.
For those students who are interested in quitting smoking, the Longest Student Health Center offers several options. Students can sign up to participate in the Q Program at the pharmacy or call the Q-Line for professional counseling. Health educators are also on staff to answer students’ questions.
Graduate assistant Casey Wilson is one of those health educators. It is part of his job to get certain health issues out to students, and he does so by putting up a tobacco display board in Colvard Union and the Sanderson Center every week.
“People perceive college students to smoke more than they do. Seventy percent do not smoke,” Wilson said. “It’s still bad, though.”
Wilson said that tobacco-related illness kills almost one person per minute in the United States.
“The Marlboro Man died from lung cancer caused by tobacco,” he said.
A brochure Wilson had from the health education office said that within 20 minutes of quitting, a smoker’s blood pressure returns to normal and within 24 hours of quitting his chance of a heart attack has already been reduced.
Within one year, risks of coronary heart disease are reduced by half and within 15 years the risk equals that of a non-smoker.
The health center offers the Q Program to interested students courtesy of the grant given to Mississippi from the tobacco settlements. The program gives free nicotine patches and gum to students who have signed up to be in the program.
Pharmacist Shannon Street said that the program is based in Jackson and operates via fax.
“Students come fill out a form, we fax it to Jackson and they send us back a list of students in the program. Then, every week, the students can come by and pick up their free patches or gum,” Street said. “We’re sort of like middlemen.”
Health center physicians can recommend students to join the program, or they can sign up voluntarily.
Graduate student Jeremy Thornton smokes even though he said he knows how harmful tobacco products are.
“I’ve tried to quit, but I’ve been unsuccessful,” Thornton said. “The patches are usually more expensive than the cigarettes.”
Thornton said he would probably use the Q Program after he learned about it.
Any other student who would like to quit smoking can contact the health center at 325-7539 to make an appointment with a clinician.
For other professional counseling options, students can call the Quit-Line at 1-877-4US2ACT or the College Tobacco Quit-Line at 1-888-244-9100. Information can also be found at www.quitnet.org.