Claire Fiddian-Green is the President & CEO of the Richard M. Fairbanks Foundation. Comprehensive tobacco control efforts play a critical role in reducing smoking and lowering the health and economic toll of the smoking epidemic. But Indiana woefully underfunds these initiatives, falling far below federal recommendations and dollars spent in other states, according to a new report commissioned by the Richard M. Fairbanks Foundation. Indiana devoted just $8.2 million in federal and state spending in 2016 to preventing Hoosiers from starting to smoke, helping them quit, and protecting people from secondhand smoke. This is only 11 percent of the $73.5 million recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention […]

Claire Fiddian-Green is the President & CEO of the Richard M. Fairbanks Foundation. One in three Hoosier adults is obese, and more than two in three are overweight or obese, costing Indiana an estimated $8.5 billion in 2017– most of which is borne by households and the private sector. A report released today by the Richard M. Fairbanks Foundation underscores these findings, showing that obesity has increased dramatically in Marion County and Indiana, becoming one of the most significant preventable causes of morbidity and mortality. The report shows that in Indiana, obesity rose from 20 percent in 1995 to 34 percent in 2017 – a rate that is the 12th highest […]