SBOH - Environmental Health Committee
(September 14, 2020) - Initial Update

Committee members learned that “health burdens related to tobacco and vapor products” would remain one of the agency’s top four legislative priorities for the next two years.

• Washington State Board of Health (SBOH) Executive Director Michelle Davis spoke about progress drafting the agency’s biannual State Health Report (audio - 5m), a description of “proposed priorities for the Governor for the upcoming legislative session.” Davis expected to have a draft of the report for board members to review prior to their October 13th meeting.
  • See the 2016 and 2018 reports.
• The second priority was “a focus on health burdens related to tobacco and vapor products, which has also been a focus of past reports.”
  • The 2018 report section on “Improving Health By Decreasing Use of Tobacco and Vapor Products” stated: “With the changes in smoking options, the Board has begun using the generic term ‘smoking’ to include exposure to all forms of inhaled products, including tobacco, vaporized products with electronic devices, and marijuana smoking. This more comprehensive terminology is important because all sources of inhaled substances have an adverse effect on health, which worsens with long-term use.”
• Following approval by the Board, the Report would be submitted to the Washington State Office of Financial Management (OFM) “for its review and approval, and once we have that we’ll submit it for publication.”

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