With statistics coming in from all around, there is an encouraging piece of
good news for the anti-smoking groups, thanks to whose campaigns, the
smoking rates for adult smokers has dropped down a teeny bit, this year, to
21.9% from the earlier 23%.
In a survey conducted by the Gallup Korea on behalf of the Ministry of
Health, Welfare and Family Affairs, it has come to the fore that the smoking
rates of men came down to 40.2 percent from the previous 42percent and those
for women dropped to 3.7 percent from the earlier 4.6 percent.
Despite the fact that the decline in smoking is very minimal over the last
one year, but the ministry is not overlooking the decreasing numbers that
have come over the past one decade. When looked at cumu7latively, they do
sound encouraging.
With numerous anti-smoking campaigns, public awareness efforts through
advertisements, taxes on cigarettes, increasing the non smoking areas and
zones in the country and similar such efforts the government has been able
to help people get rid of this bad habit, even if the numbers are small as
of now.
Anti smoking clinics and tighter government regulations too has helped make
the difference and encouraged by the statistics the government plans to
continue with its efforts.
Similar results have been seen in other parts of the globe too. According to
surveys it was seen that eight people are quitting the bad habit every day
in Gloucestershire.
Over 3000 people quit smoking in the county last year, which was a
tremendous feat. Overall in South West 33,138 people quit smoking, making it
a startling 9% fall than the previous years.
The survey published in the NHS Information Centre last week, showed that
over 5000 people pledged to quit smoking this year in Gloucestershire.
Dr Gabriel Scally, regional director of public health at NHS South West,
said: "It is encouraging that so many people in the South West have gone
smoke free in the past year.”Quitting is not easy, but the support of family
and friends can make a real difference to help people to quit smoking for
good."
With pressures from friends and family mounting, research says it becomes
necessary for smokers to quit as family pressure plays a vital role. Many
women are said to quit smoking when asked to do so by their kids.
According to the research, one in six people quit smoking because they were
scared of harming their children, while family pressure, love and support
helped a one in five people to give it up for good.
With NHS launching the IOU help books for family members offering tips on
how to help family members quit smoking and also opening NHS stop smoking
services around the residential areas, the group plans to take its anti
smoking efforts to higher levels now.
While the numbers are encouraging at one end, it is also surprising at the
other end to think how, knowing the ill effects of smoking way too well many
people still are reluctant giving it up.
With second hand smoking being as dangerous as first hand smoking and
cigarette smoking being the main cause of lung cancerdefine world over and
lung cancer itself being the most common form of cancer around the globe, it
is surprising how so many people are still smoking.
It most difficult for authorities today to make teenagers leave this bad
habit. Not only this, cigarette sales see a four to six percent increase in
most of the countries, every year.
With such kind of inputs coming from around the world a slight decline in
smoking rates might be encouraging, but not satisfying enough. This
indicates we are way too far still, from creating a smoke free world, asking
for stringent rules, regulations and if need be stricter anti-smoking
government policies, lest it gets too late to mend the problem.
