MENDOTA - When Mendota resident Jesse Arellano traveled to Washington, D.C. as a volunteer with ACS CAN (American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network) last week, he had no idea that the Illinois delegation would receive the top national award for their work.

Arellano

For the past six years, Arellano has attended the ACS CAN Leadership Summit and Lobby Day, serving as the lead volunteer for the 16th Congressional District in Illinois. During this trip, 700 volunteers from across the country meet with their members of Congress to advocate for various cancer related issues such as funding for research that will help to end a disease that kills about 1,660 people every day in the United States.

Each year, one state is chosen to receive the National Award for Advocacy Leadership for their efforts within their state. On the night the awards were announced, Arellano said all 700 volunteers were gathered together. “The state winners always have this amazing list of accomplishments,” he explained, “but when they started talking about this year’s winner and what they had done, we started to realize it was us. We were really excited and surprised.”

On that list of accomplishments by the Illinois group were two significant, hard fought items - raising the age to purchase tobacco products to 21 and increasing the sales tax on cigarettes by $1 per pack. “For several years we’d been trying to push for the age to purchase tobacco to 21 without much success, it was hard to get enough votes,” he said. “When we finally got enough votes in the Illinois House and Senate to pass the law, former Gov. Bruce Rauner vetoed it.”

After Gov. JB Pritzker was elected, the bill again passed and it was finally signed into law by Pritzker. “We worked with hundreds and hundreds of partners trying to accomplish this goal,” Arellano recalled. “About 50 hospitals and health organizations had signed on with us but the ACS was the lead.”

Arellano said having congress agree to increase the sales tax by $1 per pack on cigarettes was also a struggle, “It was a really long fight to make that happen.”

In addition, Arellano was very excited that Illinois Senator Dick Durbin was chosen to receive the ACS CAN’s 2019 National Distinguished Advocacy Award, the highest national advocacy honor given to state and federal lawmakers who undertake extraordinary efforts to achieve progress in the fight against cancer. Durbin was thanked for his longstanding dedication to enacting laws to curb tobacco use, protect people from second-hand smoke, and for supporting research at the National Institutes of Health and National Cancer Institute.

Arellano said his trips to Washington, D.C. as an ACS CAN volunteer are very exciting. “A lot of lobbying groups go to Washington, but very few of them have a representative from every congressional district in the country and Puerto Rico,” he pointed out. “We also had international representatives from nine different countries join us. We all wear our blue ACS shirts and I think it’s impressive for members of congress to see this huge group of people in DC trying to make positive changes.”

Looking ahead, Arellano said they are working on the “Safe Kids Act,” which would eliminate flavoring from all types of cigarettes including e-cigarettes, and the “Reversing the Youth Epidemic Act,” a federal law that would raise the age to purchase cigarettes to 21 across the country and ban online sales of cigarettes. “We were the first group to talk about an e-cigarette bill,” he noted. “We were already concerned even before these latest deaths among e-cigarette users were reported. If e-cigarettes help you stop smoking regular cigarettes, that’s great, but now more kids are vaping.”

Statistically, 27 percent of kids reported using tobacco products in 2018. Youth use of e-cigarettes skyrocketed by 78 percent among high schoolers over the last year alone and use among middle school students is also on the rise. Marketing campaigns feature fruit, candy and menthol flavored products in order to appeal to kids and it has worked. More than 80 percent of kids who have used tobacco products report they first try a flavored one.

“Rather than starting with cigarettes, they’re starting with those products,” Arellano said. “They are targeting youth and we’re asking our legislators for their support.”