STOP-SMOKING EFFORT
WINS NATIONAL AWARD
June 21, 2005
LAS VEGAS, Nev. – Providence Health Plan, recognized as a leader in Oregon’s stop-smoking efforts, has received a national award for a statewide campaign that engages employers to help smokers quit.
PHP received the America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP) Community Leadership Award for its work with “Make It Your Business: Insure a Tobacco-Free Workforce.” AHIP is a national trade association representing nearly 1,300 health plans that cover 200 million people. Dr. Charles Bentz, medical director for Providence’s Tobacco Cessation & Prevention Program and member of the Make It Your Business Advisory Committee, accepted the AHIP award at the association’s annual meeting in Las Vegas.
Make It Your Business urges businesses and insurers to voluntarily cover and promote help for smokers who want to quit. The Tobacco-Free Coalition of Oregon (TOFCO), a coalition that works to stem the health and economic toll of tobacco, works with Providence and other leaders in business, labor, insurance, and health policy on various strategies to reach employers.
Providence supports a community approach to curbing tobacco use and has worked closely with TOFCO for the past decade on a number of initiatives. “A single insurer can only do so much,” said Jack Friedman, chief executive, Providence Health Plan. “But if all employers and health plans help smokers quit, businesses build a healthy, productive workforce. Parents live to see grandchildren. And together, we curb the enormous human and financial toll of tobacco.”
Smoking is the leading preventable cause of premature death and disability in Oregon and the nation. Every year, it kills 7,000 Oregonians, costing billions in health care and lost productivity. Three-quarters of Oregon’s smokers say they want to quit. Every year, more than half try to quit – mostly on their own – without success. Smokers are two to three times more likely to successfully quit with effective help. Yet, only 39 percent of Oregon’s privately insured smokers are covered for stop-smoking help.
Providence, along with other Oregon health insurers, had worked for eight years with TOFCO’s Health Systems Task Force to broaden stop-smoking treatment before this latest effort to engage health care purchasers and health insurance agents through the Make It Your Business campaign. The campaign started as a pilot project in July 2002 with a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation grant.
For more information contact:
Gary Walker
503-215-7567
gary.walker@providence.org
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Providence Health Plans provides health care coverage services to more than 800,000 adults and children in Oregon, Washington and Alaska. Providence focuses on improving the health of its members by creating access to high quality health care programs and preventive services through top-rated benefit plans that are preferred by providers and customers. Providence Health Plans is part of Providence Health System, Oregon’s largest network of health services and the state’s second-largest private employer. Visit www.providence.org/healthplans.
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