Study: States Shortchanging Tobacco Prevention Efforts

A new study shows states still have a long way to go in the nationwide effort to protect kids from tobacco. Researchers found states are continuing to shortchange tobacco prevention programs.Tobacco is the number one cause of preventable death in the United States.It kills about 480,000 Americans every year."The overall adult smoking rate is still around 17 percent the overall youth smoking rate is around 15 percent, so there's still a lot to be done," said Peter Fisher, with Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids.Fisher says states spend less than $500,000 from the $25 billion they get in tobacco prevention funds.That's less than two percent of their total revenues.-----------------------------------------------------------------More than 90 percent of high school students are chronically sleep deprived.After tracking findings from four federal surveys, researchers found less than 10 percent of students said they were meeting current CDC guidelines for sleep.Girls tended to get less sleep than boys and black teens got less sleep than their white peers.Researchers say early school start times could be a factor in the lack of sleep.------------------------------------------------------------------The pill remains one of the most popular methods of birth control for women.A new report shows two thirds of women between 15 and 45 use some form of birth control.Nearly 16 percent used the pill, about 15 percent had their tubes closed or blocked and nearly 10 percent used condoms.Experts say the pill is so popular because it's familiar and has been around the longest.