Fewer young people in Wisconsin are admitting to smoking cigarettes this year.

The 2010 Wisconsin Youth Tobacco Survey shows smoking rates have dropped 15-percent among high school students, and 9-percent among middle-school students since 2008.

Beth Kaplan, spokeswoman for the Wisconsin Department of Health Services -- which helps conduct the survey every two years -- credits anti-smoking messages from the community, schools, and media. She also credits Wisconsin's higher cigarette tax. Kaplan says the increased cost of a pack of cigarettes “may be the straw that makes the teenager decide not to smoke."

Less than 18 percent of high school students in Wisconsin admitted to smoking cigarettes to the survey this year. In middle school, the number is just under four percent.

(Superior Telegram, 09/08/2010)