What did fmr. US surgeon general and WISH med. expert say about smoking rates
INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — News 8 on Friday asked Dr. Jerome Adams, WISH-TV medical expert and a former U.S. surgeon general, about his thoughts on new data showing fewer adults are smoking cigarettes but turning to vapes and electronic cigarettes.
“It’s a mixed bag. We’re at the lowest smoking rates in history. In terms of combustible tobacco, that is absolutely a good thing that will lead to less lung cancer, less heart disease and so on.
“However, what we’re seeing is that vaping is rising, particularly in young people who would not have otherwise used cigarettes, and so you’ve got a new generation of people being addicted to nicotine and that can cause heart problems. It can also cause mental health issues because young people are withdrawing from this high-dose nicotine and they’re having anxiety, they’re having depression.”
“So we need to celebrate the the decreases in smoking while at the same time be very cognizant of the fact that a new generation of young people are becoming big tobacco’s next customers. I was down at Indiana University recently, and they told me over 50% of the students on campus are vaping. That’s very concerning to me.”
Lilly’s new obesity drug poised to upend weight loss care
Tirzepatide, an Eli Lilly and Co. drug approved to treat type 2 diabetes under the brand name Mounjaro, helped people with the disease who were overweight or had obesity lose up to 16% of their body weight, or more than 34 pounds, over nearly 17 months, the company said on Thursday.
Adams said, “Adams said, “There’s this whole new class of drugs that have been designed and developed for diabetes, for Type 2 diabetes, and what they found is that people who were on this class of drugs actually lost weight. Eli Lilly’s version of this product showed amazing results … 34 pound weight loss up to 16% of body weight loss, and so that’s a good thing. It’s absolutely a good thing that people have more options to lose weight other than just surgery. But, we want people to remember that the best way to lower your weight is by diet and exercise and that it’s better not to put on the weight in the first place, and so we want to make sure we’re giving people the supports they need to try behavioral changes before we lean on medications to do the job, and weight loss is included in the whole spectrum of health and public health.”
Indiana lawmakers send public health bill to the governor
Thursday’s passage of Indiana Senate Bill 4 represented the culmination of more than two years of work for Sen. Ed Charbonneau, a Republican from Valparaiso. The measure defines a core set of public health services county health departments would have to provide in order to qualify for expanded state funding. Those services range from sanitary inspections of public buildings and tattoo parlors to tobacco control to preventing and reducing chronic illnesses such as obesity and diabetes.
Adams said, “Indiana has some of the worst health statistics of any state, and it’s correlated to the fact that we have some of the lowest public health funding, so we’re not preventing disease from happening in the first place. The Indiana state legislature approved SB 4, a bill put forward by Sen. Charbonneau that will send $225 million over the next two years to local health departments, but they have to invest in 10 public health measures that are laid out in the bill.
“This is absolutely a good thing. It’s less than what the governor had originally asked for and what Sen. Charbonneau had originally asked for from the legislature, so we still have more work to do. But, it’s the largest expenditure on public health in the state’s history. It’s something we should celebrate.”
This story was created from a live interview on WISH-TV. Health spotlight is presented by Community Health Network.