Federal tax increase gives many Georgians incentive to kick the habit

Georgians are trying to quit smoking in droves, driven by the highest-ever federal tax increase on tobacco products.

The additional 62-cent tax pushed a pack of cigarettes to more than $5 in Georgia, and has led many smokers to the patch, the hypnosis tape and the telephone hotline.

“Every time I buy a pack it’s so much money,” said Whitney Sherrill, 25, who lives in Atlanta’s Inman Park. “It’s just ridiculous.”

Sherrill, a pack-a-day smoker, has long wanted to quit. She’s tried but always come back. Lately, the voice in her head that’s urged her to stop has been joined by a message from her purse.

At a pack a day, a smoker could be throwing away up to $1,825 a year on a habit with a downside that could lead to death.

“It’s got to stop right now,” Sherrill said, adding that she has the stop-smoking patches and a hypnosis tape.

Lots of Georgians are joining her. The national tax went into effect April 1. To make matters worse for smokers, many tobacco companies started raising prices a month earlier.

Calls to the Georgia smoking Quit Line jumped 120 percent, to 616 calls, in March, compared with 280 for the same month a year ago.

This March was up 23 percent over February of this year, and the first week of April is trending toward a 125 percent jump over March.

“When the price goes up … people realize the expense of it and the toll on their health,” said Martha Dismer, smoking cessation coordinator with the Georgia Division of Public Health.

Callers to the Georgia Tobacco Quit Line, at 1-877-270-STOP, speak to a trained counselor who helps them assess the triggers that prompt the desire to smoke and the methods to fight the urge.

Dismer is concerned about having enough money in the budget to sustain the service until the end of the fiscal year in July. The agency contracts with a company that charges by the call. Other states have reduced or temporarily stopped the service on their quit lines because of the spike in calls.

The American Cancer Society reports a 268 percent jump in calls in its 11-state quit line so far this month, compared with the same period a year ago.

But sticker shock goes only so far in motivating a person to quit, and many will return to the habit, said Dr. Matthew McKenna, director of the office on smoking and health at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta.

In Georgia, about 20 percent of adults at least 18 years old smoke. That percentage is similar to the national average, according to the CDC.

While McKenna believes as many as 1.5 million Americans will quit smoking because of the cost increase, he suspects the spike in quit-line callers will greatly subside in a month or so.

In general, a person may try quitting six to 10 times before succeeding, he said. Acting solo, a person has about a 5 percent chance of success.

Calling a quit line can boost that to 10 percent, and adding some medication such as a stop-smoking patch can raise it to 20 percent, he said.

Ed Wadhams, an Alpharetta insurance worker, has added some political motivation. He believes the federal government is spending “like drunken sailors,” and he doesn’t want to give it any more money than he has to.

So for the past month, every time he gets the urge to buy a pack, he thinks about his money feeding the federal coffers. This was one tax, he said, he had a choice in.

“I felt fed up,” Wadhams said.