The Navicent Health Foundation has awarded the Georgia Healthy Family Alliance $100,000 in support of the Tar Wars Strike Force Initiative which provides early prevention tobacco and vaping education for school students. The national program combats the growing uptick in vaping device use among middle and high school students.
According to the National Institutes of Health, 3.6 million youth — 1 in 5 high school students and 1 in 20 middle school students — reported vaping in 2020. In Georgia, 26.1 percent of high school students reported using e-cigarettes in 2018, according to the Georgia Department of Public Health.
Tar Wars educates elementary school students about the dangerous health effects of tobacco and vape use, the costs associated with using tobacco products and the effective advertising and messaging techniques used by the tobacco and e-cigarette industry to market its products to youth.
The $100,000 grant from the Navicent Health Foundation will reach approximately 20,000 fourth and fifth grade students in Baldwin, Bibb, Bleckley, Crawford, Dodge, Houston, Johnson, Jones, Laurens, Monroe, Peach, Treutlen, Twiggs, Washington and Wilkinson counties over the next three school years.
“The Navicent Health Foundation is proud to support the Georgia Healthy Family Alliance and the Georgia Academy of Family Physicians in their efforts to reach these young children and help them to make healthy choices,” said Navicent Health Foundation President Ellen Johnson. “Children are our future and the more we can do to set them on a path for a healthy future, the healthier our communities will be in the years to come.”
To learn more about the Tar Wars Strike Force Initiative, visit georgiahealthyfamilyalliance.org/tarwars.
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