U.S. State and Local Issues

Spending on Tobacco Prevention: Nevada

Last updated November 29, 2011

  FY2012 FY2011
State Rank 50 51
State Spending on Tobacco Prevention $0 $0
% of CDC Recommended Spending
($32.5 million)		 0.0% 0.0%

Summary: The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends that Nevada spend $32.5 million a year to have an effective, comprehensive tobacco prevention program.  Nevada currently allocates $0.0 a year for tobacco prevention and cessation.  This is 0.0% of the CDC’s recommendation and ranks Nevada 50th among the states in the funding of tobacco prevention programs.  Nevada’s spending on tobacco prevention amounts to 0.0% of the estimated $147 million in tobacco-generated revenue the state collects each year from settlement payments and tobacco taxes.

Recent Developments: Nevada’s programs were funded entirely through settlement payments, so funding levels would change if the actual settlement payments were different than projected.  A 1999 state law divided Nevada’s settlement money into three trust funds: 40 percent to the Millennium Trust Fund for college scholarships; 10 percent to the Trust Fund for Public Health; and 50 percent to the Fund for a Healthy Nevada. Initially, 20 percent of the money directed to the Fund for a Healthy Nevada was distributed to the tobacco prevention and cessation program; however, in 2007, this allocation was reduced to 15 percent.

In FY2012, there will be no state funding for tobacco prevention and cessation programs in Nevada.  This is the same as what was spent in FY2011, when, due to revenue shortfalls, state funding for tobacco prevention and cessation programs was completely eliminated.  The program is surviving on minimal dollars from the CDC, although many grantees, including local health districts, are no longer receiving funding from the state.  The tobacco programs at the Southern Nevada Health District received federal stimulus funds through the Communities Putting Prevention to Work grant, but this is a one-time appropriation that will end in March 2012.

Nevada is receiving $947,636 million in federal funds dedicated to tobacco prevention and control:

  • $857,537 from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in a 12-month grant for the period beginning April 2011 (from annual appropriations).

  • $90,099 from the Prevention and Public Health Fund in the new health care reform law.