Tobacco use increasing amongst the younger generation

Though the ill effects of tobacco have been known for a long time and several campaigns, official and unofficial, have met with different degrees of success or failure, as the case may be, the new challenge facing the anti-smoking authorities is the task of discouraging the youth from consuming tobacco in any form. This and some other issues are being discussed on May 31, being observed as the World 'No Tobacco' Day. According to the Global Youth Tobacco Survey (GYTS) fact sheet, more and more children and teenagers are taking to cigarette smoking and other forms of tobacco consumption especially during school age, increasingly, for social approval. The fact sheet was prepared after taking into account the prevalence of tobacco and cigarette use, the attitude towards it, its availability and price and the effects of exposure to tobacco smoke. It revealed that almost 7% of students smoked cigarettes habitually while more than half of them consumed other tobacco products like pan masala. Most children felt that it was "cool" to smoke and that smokers were more attractive and had more friends than non-smokers. Contrarily, the study also showed that about 72.2% students were in favour of banning smoking in public places. Another issue that may be pertinent enough to be discussed on such an occasion is the relative negligence of the extent of beedi smoking in India. According to the WHO Regional Advisor on Tobacco related issues, beedi smoking is possibly more harmful than cigarettes. This is because beedi contains a higher amount of crude nicotine and other harmful substances. The problem is made worse by the sheer number of people who smoke beedis. More than 40% of the 250 million tobacco users smoke beedis as against 20% who smoke cigarettes. However, beedi smokers are not given much priority in India since most of them belong to the lower socio-economic strata of the society. This is combined with low awareness of the dangers of tobacco among the Indian masses, making the problem very difficult to resolve. Expert say that that best medicine for the diseases caused by smoking is awareness. The more people know about the vicious stranglehold of nicotine addiction, the better managed it will be. The recent ban on tobacco sale near schools may prove to be the first step on the road to freedom from this vice.

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