The American FDA recently increased the legal age for smoking from 18 years to 21. This decision was appreciated by all the sectors of people. Many countries are now taking firm action following its footsteps. The Tobacco Companies are still playing with the innocent lives of young kids.
These companies want to continue the act of pretending to be unaware of the fact that smoking tobacco leads to lung cancer. They are only concerned about their sales of cigarettes and other tobacco products. They are mostly targeting kids between the age group of 12 to 14 years as the habit in this age leads to dependence on the tobacco products.
Why this decision is important ?
- The habit of smoking starts in childhood lasts for a lifetime for many of the kids. They also develop loyalty for a particular brand during this age. They can’t find an easy way to quit smoking after that.
- Every effort is made by them to satisfy their addiction. They will steal from their parents wallets or sell any valuable items from their own houses. Many of them may undertake any criminal activities to get easy money as they can’t quit smoking cravings easily.
- By the time they reach 18 years of age it is already late. Quitting cigarette addiction becomes very difficult.
- Nicotine makes their bodies a home for many life threatening diseases. Premature deaths occur as the addiction starts early. The number of deaths due to tobacco is alarmingly increasing day by day. So quit tobacco medicines should be used to fight this addiction.
- This decision is to discourage young children from reaching for the cigarettes. They buy it from a young adult person like their elder friends or cousins or peers who are responsible in the first place to introduce them to this addiction. If the age is increased, it will be difficult for these people to get hold of the tobacco products. So it will be difficult for them to provide the same to the addicted children.
- The children are in an age when their physical development is going on. Nicotine affects the overall growth. This affects their life as an adult. So its better if they learn how to stop smoking immediately.
- Many factors lead the kids to this addiction such as parental smoking , peers or older friends, relatives teach them how to smoke for fun,or the kids themselves want to find out what it is like to smoke or it is considered okay in many families to smoke as they barely understand the seriousness of the problem which spoils the life of young ones.
What to do for encouraging such decisions ?
- Have full knowledge about the law. So that it will be easy to educate the kids regarding this. Their queries can be answered properly. You should be able to prove that the decision is for their own good.
- Starting campaign focusing on the ill-effects of this addiction when taken at a young age.
- You might try to highlight the sufferings of the parents who can’t see their young one wasting their precious life in this useless thing instead of doing a lot of good things.
- After the law is implemented making them understand that the law is for their own benefit and its not meant to be broken.
- Involve the children in the tobacco free movement as they will understand the dangerousness of tobacco by looking at live examples and meeting tobacco affected families.
- The strategies of the Tobacco Industry to attract kids to use tobacco products through cartoons should be exposed . Many adults fall for the cigarette addiction as they are in their tender adolescent age. The marketing and attractive advertisement strategies of the Tobacco Companies affect them in this age. In fact they target this age group particularly. For this every possible means is used.
- Tensions and difficulties are a part of life. You should learn to cope with them head on. Don’t try to find any quick solutions or run away from them. Smoking is not and never will be an answer to them.
- Following anything just because it is done by any influential person is bad. Children often attracted to doing such things are unaware of what mistakes they are making. It is better to stop them before it is too late.
- The age is for making some good thing of their life. It is the foundation on which all life depends. It should be concrete and have a proper guidance.
- Low self-confidence often leads to bad decisions. Parents, teachers should have a good watch on the kids. Every suspicious change should be evaluated so that any addiction can be stopped before it takes a dangerous turn.
- We should give this social cause utmost importance as today’s young generation is spoiled to an irrevocable extent due to this addiction.
- You can find many deaddiction centres in cities like Thane, Pune and Mumbai. These centres provide you easy ways to stop smoking. You will get a proper guidance for achieving your goal through leave smoking tips found here.
- You could have advice from quit smoking sites like www.letsquit.net. They understand the problem of smoking very well. Medical assistance as well as encouragement for keeping up with your motto of “I want to quit smoking cigarette!” is provided here.
References:
www.lung.org
www.aap.org