Political Factors and Tobacco Knowledge Predict Legislators’ Support for Tobacco Control Policies

Studies carried out by the Ontario Tobacco Research Unit have identified key factors that may help predict whether legislators will support tobacco policies. This Update summarizes the study results which imply that political ideology and party membership can predict legislators’ support for tobacco control policies and other public health measures. Public health professionals and tobacco control advocates need to be more attentive to political ideology and party membership when enlisting legislator support for healthy public policy and work to increase tobacco knowledge among legislators.