The State We're In

We bring you another special episode in our series on COVID-19 on growing food and community connections. There is a growing need for healthy foods in Minnesota, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. Minnesota is home to sizeable food security disparities. The pandemic has not only exacerbated these gaps, but also shown how food insecurity can be correlated with stress, anxiety, and fear.

This episode focuses on some of our partners— farmers, gardeners and community leaders —who improve our local food system, build strong communities, and share their knowledge about growing food.

We bring you a special episode on coping and mental health in the times of COVID-19. This pandemic is forcing us to change our lives in ways we never imagined. Supporting and caring for one another is more important than ever, and we’re doing it in new ways.

Everyone reacts to stressful situations differently. We had the opportunity to get some advice from community leaders, teachers, and behavioral health professionals about strategies for coping and taking care of each other during this time.

As the vaping epidemic continues in Minnesota, we bring you a preview of our upcoming video documentary: stories from the people on the front lines of this fight against big tobacco.

The 2019 Minnesota Student Survey found more than a quarter of Minnesota 11th-graders and 11 percent of 8th-graders used an e-cigarette in the past month. From 2016-2019, the 8th-grade vaping rate nearly doubled.

The commercial tobacco industry uses flavors to attract these kids. Two thirds of current high-school tobacco users in Minnesota reported using a flavored product.

The deliberate marketing tactics used by the tobacco industry have made vaping popular among youth. The Minnesota Student Survey also found that Eighty-eight percent of Minnesota high-school students are exposed to e-cigarette ads. Investigations have revealed e-cigarette maker JUUL targeted kids as young as eight with marketing including a summer camp, school programs and social media influencers. The state of Minnesota has sued JUUL Labs for illegally advertising to youth and engaging in deceptive practices.

Flavored tobacco products are driving the youth nicotine epidemic, which has erased nearly two decades of progress to reduce youth tobacco use. The alarming rise of youth vaping goes hand-in-hand with the insidious impact of predatory marketing the commercial tobacco industry has targeted at marginalized communities – including African Americans, American Indians, and LGBTQ people.

In the podcast we’ll hear from Laura Smith, Senior Public Affairs Manager at ClearWay Minnesota.

Will Gitler and Claire Hering share their personal experiences with vaping. These experiences led them to join local action and advocacy work to reverse this epidemic and protect the health of all Minnesotans.

Watch for more on vaping epidemic in our upcoming documentary, where we continue with these conversations. We’ll also explore how vaping is impacting Native American youth from the Lower Sioux Indian Community and how tribal leaders are addressing the problem. We’ll learn more about the serious health impacts of vaping from Dr. Brook Moore, a pediatric pulmonologist at Children’s Hospitals and Clinics of Minnesota.

This episode focuses on the great work of Healthy Together Willmar, and their mission to help create a future where all members of the Willmar, MN community have access to the resources and opportunities needed to achieve their best possible health.

In Willmar, achieving good health is met with considerable barriers, which are often experienced most by an increasingly diverse and aging population. To address some of these barriers, the Healthy Together Willmar initiative launched the Idea Fund, creating an opportunity for community members to submit ideas to affect change.

Now in its second round of funding, more than $264,000 was awarded to community groups in Willmar to offer support and solutions related to physical, mental and behavioral health, community connections, access to dental care, the availability of culturally based childcare and more.

The Idea Fund process kicked off in the fall of 2018, with residents attending a “progressive dinner,” community meals at homes throughout Willmar, where they engaged in conversations about how to address the community’s barriers to health. From there, ideas were submitted to the Willmar Community Table, which is comprised of diverse residents who have firsthand experience facing barriers to health.

Find more information about Healthy Together Willmar and the idea fund here.

At the Center for Prevention we are funded from the proceeds of Blue Cross’ historical settlement with the commercial tobacco industry, and we use these resources to help fight health inequities in Minnesota. Addressing the harms caused by commercial tobacco is core to our work. While the overall smoking rate in Minnesota has dramatically decreased, commercial tobacco use remains one of the leading causes of death and disease. Marketing of these products continues to cause more destruction for communities of color, American Indians, immigrants and refugees.

Throughout its history, the commercial tobacco industry has been misrepresenting and appropriating American Indian traditions, values and beliefs to market and sell their products. It’s a direct assault on American Indian culture, traditions and practices.

We have had the privilege to work with tribal communities to help reduce harm caused by commercial tobacco, and we are grateful for what we’ve learned along the way. Understanding the difference between commercial tobacco and sacred tobacco is critically important for shifting the dominant narrative around Tribal communities and their health. In the next three episodes of the State We’re In, we’ll explore how honoring sacred tobacco and cultural traditions can lead to healing for Anishinaabe and Dakota people in Minnesota.

These episodes are inspired by dedicated leaders who are doing this work. Over the summer we’ve had opportunities to have several conversations about sacred tobacco, healing from addiction, and health in Minnesota’s American Indian Communities.

We begin our series with conversations with Chris Matter, Senior Program Manager at Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota, and CoCo Villaluz, Senior Community Development Manager for ClearWay Minnesota, to get some background on how mainstream organizations and Native American communities are working together to reduce commercial tobacco use.