Medicaid users will get help to quit smoking

Beginning Tuesday, Washington Medicaid clients will have access to a new stop-smoking benefit, including counseling and prescription drugs.

Secretary Robin Arnold-Williams of the Department of Social and Health Services said in a news release that smoking rates remain high among low-income people, despite an overall downward trend. The adult smoking rate has declined by 24 percent since the state’s Tobacco Prevention and Control Program began in 2000.

DSHS is working with the Department of Health, and the state’s Tobacco Quit Line will now help link Medicaid clients to the new benefit. Washington residents can call (800) QUIT-NOW or (800) 2NO-FUME for Spanish-speakers.

Coaches will help eligible Medicaid clients with free counseling, nicotine patches or gum and by recommending prescription medications, if appropriate. The benefit will cover the prescriptions if prescribed by the client’s doctor.

The Centers for Disease Control estimates that 14 percent of all Medicaid expenditures are related to smoking. DSHS estimates that about 160,000 of the state’s Medicaid clients smoke and that Medicaid will reach 5 percent of them in the first year of the new benefit.