Special Offer Golden Gate Blue Golden Gate Blue $1300 Buy Now
Catalog
Voting poll

What do You most appreciate on this store?

Tell a Friend
Payment Instructions
Newsletters

Health Insurance Rises For Smoking MTSU Employees

Members of the MTSU faculty, staff and administration will undergo a massive increase in the premium of their health care if they do not quit smoking cigarettes by the first of July.

Tennessee passed the Tobacco Use Surcharge and Quitter's Refund program that will go into effect on January 1, 2010. Any state employee who is considered a smoker during open-enrollment next October, which is an employee who has not quit by July, will be assessed $50 a month on top of their current premium.

"Essentially, we all save in the long run," said Pat Spangler, the medical director for MTSU Health Services. "We save in the number of diseases and in the number of early deaths and we save money; it's a win-win all the way around."

Karen Milstead, the benefits specialist for the MTSU Department of Human Resources, said during the open enrollment that each employee will have to sign a form that certifies whether they are a smoker or a non-smoker. The smoker's will be charged the Tobacco Use Surcharge.

"The state will also be assessing penalties for perjury," Milstead said. "Those who certify non-smoker when they do smoke cigarettes are also immediately liable for a $300 penalty."

The MTSU Human Resources Web site stated that the additional $300 penalty was due to the perjury breaching the employee contract with the state. According to the Web site that while human resources has not decided on randomized testing, the university reserves the right to issue a saliva test for cotinine levels.

"The certified smokers will have the ability to get back at least six months of the surcharge," Milstead said. "If they remain cheap cheap cigarettes online free for six months, they will receive a refund for the $300."

Spangler said that if an employee quits smoking cigarettes they would not only save $50 a month, the estimated savings would be "in the billions."

"The biggest incentive is the long term health of the individual," Spangler said. "If you continue smoking cigarettes, your risk of emphysema, COPD [chronic obstructive pulmonary disease], and lung cancer goes up - so the idea here is that if we can lower the number of people of smoking cigarettes, we can lower the number of long term diseases, therefore lowering our premiums."

Spangler said that in the big picture, many smokers end up uninsured, and the burden of their hospital bills fall upon the taxpayer.

Richard Chapman, the director of MTSU Student Health Services, said with the new financial constraints, many people will be forced to quit.

"This is coupled with the SCHIP tax in order to fund the children's health insurance program at the federal level," Chapman said. "They put a 60 cent per pack tax increase, that has made cheap smokes that much more expensive, so a lot of people are going to give them up anyway."

The Human Resources Web site provides MTSU employees with a list of smoking cigarettes cessation aids that will be offered in May at a low $5 co-pay, including Chantix and buproprion.

Spangler said that the withdrawal symptoms for tobacco addicts vary from person to person, but generally last for a few months.

"It is in our benefit to pay $150-200 a month for three months, rather than having to pay for hospitalization, for pneumonia, lung cancer, emphysema, breathing machines and oxygen for this person's life," Spangler said.

Many smoking cigarettes faculty and staff said that they felt singled out and segregated by the new law, however they respectfully declined to mention their names.

Chapman said that this trend in legislation is showing benefits to private companies as well, and the financial incentive may cause more companies to adopt similar policies.

For more information on the Tobacco Use Surcharge, the Quitter's Refund program, and smoking cigarettes cessation aids, you can visit hrs.web.mtsu.edu

Other cigarettes news and tobacco market events you can find at links bellow:

   • Best-Buy-Cigarettes.Com Tobacco News

   • Cheap Cigarettes & Tobacco News

   • Discount-Cigarettes-Planet.Com Cigarettes News





The term cigarettes, as normally employed, refers to a tobacco cigarette, but can be utilized like devices holding in other herbaceous plants, such as eugenia caryophyllatums. A cigarette is differentiated from a cigar by its modest sizing, utilization of treated leafage, and paper wrap, which is usually white hot, though other coloring materials are sometimes usable. Cigars are mostly compiled totally of whole-leaf tobacco plant.

Rates of cheap smokes changes widely, and have altered substantially over the course of human history since cigarettes were 1st wide used in the mid-19th century. While rates of smoke have over time leveled off or turned down in the highly developed world, they continue to up-rise in evolving states. Nicotine, the main psychotropic chemical substance in baccy and therefore cigarettes, has been shown to be psychologically habit forming, although it does not generate a physiologic addiction.

Cheap cigarettes usage by pregnant women has also been shown to stimulate birth defects, including mental and physical disabilities.