Kentucky Teen Smoking Has Significantly Dropped Over The Past Two Years

WKMS | By Whitney Jones

Published July 15, 2014 at 3:06 PM CDT

Significantly fewer Kentucky teens are smoking according to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control.

In 2011 the CDC found nearly a quarter of high school students in the state used cigarettes but in its most recent report that number dropped to nearly 18 percent. The decline moves Kentucky from the state with the highest rate of teen smokers to the sixth highest.

While the Commonwealth has reached its 2020 goal of reducing high school smoking to 19 percent, it hopes to reduce the rate by 10 percent in the next five years.

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Whitney Jones

Whitney grew up listening to Car Talk to and from her family’s beach vacation each year, but it wasn’t until a friend introduced her to This American Life that radio really grabbed her attention. She is a recent graduate from Union University in Jackson, Tenn., where she studied journalism. When she’s not at WKMS, you can find her working on her backyard compost pile and garden, getting lost on her bicycle or crocheting one massive blanket.

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