Exposure Towards Smoking
Transcript of Exposure Towards Smoking
Exposure Towards Smoking
Younger Generation VS Elder Generation
Introduction
• Hypothesis statement: Younger generation have greater exposure to smoking as compared to the older generation of their.
• Area of investigations: Prevalence, smoking behavior, social environment, and cause for this increase.
Background Information
• Cigarette tax
• Review of the penalty issued to the offender for under aged smoking
• Health risks printed on the cigarette box
• Banning of smoking in public areas; bus interchange, coffee shops, pubs
Investigation Sources
• Surveys
• Newspaper articles
• Health Promotion Board
• Interview
Key Findings – Newspaper Article• Posted in The Straits Times on 15th
August 2005, “stress relief the key to quitting” by Desmond Chan
• Stated in the article, “The reason given by most smokers I spoke to was: It helps beat stress.”
• The report said “the decision is supported by some smokers themselves. They are 'sympathetic' to families who have to breathe second-hand smoke in coffee shops and hawker centres”
Key Findings – HPB Research
• conducted a school-based youth tobacco survey among 13,111 secondary one to four students
• 26% have tried or ever smoked cigarettes (including just one or two puffs); approx. 3400 students
• The main reasons given for starting to smoke were to relax or relieve stress, ‘curiosity or for fun’ and to ‘follow friends’
• The reasons for smoking did not differ between the boys and girls
Key Findings – HPB Research• 54.1% of the smokers are more likely
to come from families with at least one parent smoking compared to non-smokers (32.1%)
• 33.7% of the smokers are more likely to have an older sibling who smokes compared to non-smokers (9.5%)
• 54.9% of the smokers are more likely to have half or more than half of their close friends who smoke compared to non-smokers (4.2%)
Key Findings – HPB Research• 88.3% of smokers are exposed to other
smokers at places other than their homes in the past 7 days compared to 61.6% of non-smokers
• Half the current smokers bought their cigarettes from a shop or a store. 21.9% got their cigarettes from their friends and 11.2% asked someone else to buy cigarettes for them
Key Findings – Survey Report
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
80%
90%
100%
Age <35
Age >35
Age <35
Age >35
Strongly D.
Disagree
Agree
Strgonly A.
exposure towards Increase of smoking underage
smokers
Key Findings – Survey Report
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
Smoking Under Aged Smoker
Yes
No
Key Findings – Survey Report
0 5 10 15
Curiosity
Peer
Affluence
Family
Laws
Fashion
Availability
Number
Reasons for the increase of this earlier exposure
Key Findings – Survey Report
0 1 2 3 4
Smokers
Non-smokers
Stranger
Friends
Retail shops
Sources of cigarettes for the under aged smokers
Conclusion
• Exposure towards smoking for youths is quite high as compared to older generation of theirs
• Shows sign of worsening; smoker population is increasing especially under aged smoker
• Increase of the affluence of Singaporean, parents using money to compensate their children for lack of love and concern towards their children due to working which is the current trend of parents in the modern world
Conclusion
• Disastrous impact to the country
• Unhealthy workforce will worsen the current problem of ageing population and small local talent pool/workforce
• Great burden to Government; Singapore lose it competitiveness
Solution
• Education – change the wrong concept of student towards smoking
• Reviews of penalties for the offender for under aged smoking
• Tighten loopholes for the sale of cigarettes; prevent retailer to sell cigarettes to under-aged
• Impose higher fines penalty and regular checks
Limitations
• Survey – small scale, brief one, may not be accurate
• HPB Research – outdated, done on part of the secondary schools population, never taken into consideration of dropouts, type of secondary students who done the survey
• There is no periodic research on this which can’t really show the trend of the situation for the past few years.