The Tobacco Settlement Endowment Trust is preparing for the July 1 cigarette tax increase by budgeting more for the Oklahoma Tobacco Helpline.
The helpline offers free resources to Oklahomans who want to quit smoking, including coaching and a two-week supply of nicotine replacement patches, gum or lozenges. TSET Executive Director John Woods said they usually devote $3 million to the 24 hours a day, seven days a week resource.
"We’re adding an additional $500,000 to that, and certainly we’ll look at even further expansion if necessary based on future call volumes," Woods said.
The $1 per pack price increase on cigarettes could push almost 19,000 Oklahomans to quit smoking.
"You never know what those call volumes are going to look like as you go into a new year, but we do know when the last increase occurred on a national level, as an example, the national quitline had a 115 percent increase in call volume," Woods said.
More than 365,000 people have turned to the Oklahoma Tobacco Helpline since it started in 2003.
"I’ve been there. I’m a former smoker. I’ve actually used the quitline services to quit way before I even came to TSET, and so I know they work," Woods said.
According to TSET, helpline callers who register for multiple calls have a 36 percent quit rate at seven months, compared to a 5 percent quit rate among smokers who quit cold turkey.
The Oklahoma Tobacco Helpline is available at 1-800-QUIT-NOW or online.
