Negative Effects Of Youth Smoking

In the United States, smoking cigarettes is the number one preventable cause of morbidity and death (Bergen, 1999), and accounts for $300 Billion in health care costs and economic productivity loss (Jamal, 2015). While the national smoking rate is 16.8% (CDC, 2016), specific demographics are more susceptible to developing smoking habits: people who live below the poverty line (10.9% higher), disabled or with a limitation (6.2% higher), and males (4.7% higher) (Agaku, 2014).

Over the last few decades, tobacco and nicotine prevention efforts have risen to an all time high. Prevention efforts focus on education to the public of the negative effects on one’s health when using tobacco and nicotine products, as well as with pleas to healthcare policymakers to increase restrictions on product manufacturing and sales. One policy effort growing in popularity in the United States is called Tobacco 21, which proposes to raise the legal age of purchase for consumers of tobacco and nicotine products to 21 years of age (Farber, Pakhale, & Neptune, 2016). Farber, Pakhale, and Neptune (2016) state that 90% of tobacco and nicotine users begin smoking before the age of 18, with 99% of users starting before the age of 26. Lower smoking cessation rates are associated with earlier ages of initiation and the tobacco industry is known to target youth in advertisement of these products lending to the early age of initiation. The tobacco industry themselves admit that increasing the age allowed for purchase to exclude youth would substantially effect their sales. Tobacco 21 laws also deter adolescents from gaining tobacco or nicotine products from friends 18 to 21 years of age, which is the most likely age group to supply younger teens. With this knowledge, placing tighter restrictions on consumers younger than 21 years of age, using the Tobacco 21 policy, may deter tobacco and nicotine initiation in hopes to prevent individual use at all in the future (Farber

The article gives information about the nationwide regulation restricting nicotine cigarettes in the U.S in terms of their promising outcomes such as reducing smoking among the youth and several trends of using tobacco-related products in a 10-year period. Furthermore, the authors also point put some possible challenges associated with cigarette withdrawal.

The table that was chosen from Health United States, 2014 report, was on the following determinant of health: “Current cigarette smoking among adults age 18 and over, by sex (female), race and age; United States, selected years 1965-2013”; this table (below) was listed as table 52 on the report, found on page 182. Using the data from the selected table, a specific health problem that should be the focus of one research subject in public health is cigarette smoking. Cigarette smoking is a specific health problem because the table, shows the trend of cigarette smoking (with some variation), on the decline for all categories for females (race and age) as years progress. The problem of cigarette smoking still needs to be addressed

Smoking is injurious to health and a preventable cause of premature death. In the U.S.; it is estimated that one in each five adults smoke currently and about 480,000 people die prematurely from diseases caused by smoking or secondhand smoke exposure. (CDC tobacco use). The economic burden of tobacco use is also significant. About $100 billion per year is spent in medical expenses and another $100 billion per year in lost productivity. There is no safe level of smoking

Teens smoking has been a public concern for centuries. In a recent article published earlier this year by Fox News, highlighted the rate and risk of teens smoking and the rise of e-cigarettes. One of the main question posed was, why do teens smoke? There is no definite answer,however; a few intelligible explanation has been given. Biology and developmental vulnerability are the few partially reason given. Biology studies shows that, until in their 20s and adolescents Brain is not equate enough to measure and assess assess race and long-term consequences.one reason is that teen are very vulnerable,which makes them an ideal target for cigarrette companies. luckly the federal government has set strict rules that limit tobacco companies who sets

An estimated 36.5 million or 15.1 % of adults aged 18 years old and older currently smoke cigarettes and more than 16,000,000 have smoking or live with diseases that are related to smoking. According to US department of health and human services, over the past five decades, there is a significant decline in cigarette smoking in the U.S. The progress has slowed in recent years and the prevalence of use of other tobacco products such as vapes, e-cigars and smokeless tobacco

Furthermore, in USA, nearly one of every five deaths is caused by tobacco. However, 32.9 percent of full time college students between 18 to 22 years old has smoke in the previous 30 days in 2001 and according to (Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, 2002) for the young adults the rate was higher that is 44.6 percent. Thus half of Adolescents who have already smoke 100 cigarettes or even more will smoke for at least 16-20 years (Pierce and Gilpin 1996)

Tobacco and the abuse of other smoked drugs is still among the top most causes of mortality and disease in the United States. In 2013, Center for Disease Control and prevention (CDC) published a report unveiling that 18.1% of U.S adults smoke. From the report, Tobacco use topped the list of the most dreaded etiologies of preventable mortality killing more than 480,000 people annually. This has necessitated the initiation of campaigns to promote healthy lifestyles among the population. The Get up and Run campaign is therefore among the evidence of how committed the US government is with regards to smoking cessation.

One of the largest issues today is adolescent smoking. According to a heath based website, nearly 90% of adult smokers start while they are still teens and they never intend to get hooked. They may start by bumming a cigarette or two from a friend at a party, and then go on to buying an occasional pack. Soon they realize that they can't go without that pack. They've gotten used to reaching for a cigarette first thing in the morning, after meals, or during any stressful time. They become addicted, both physically and psychologically. According to the American Lung Association, each day 6,000 children under the age of 18 smoke their first cigarette. Almost 2,000 of them will become regular smokers – that’s 757, 000 new smokers annually!

The tobacco industry is important to the economy. In 1991, worldwide tobacco sales exceeded $59.8 billion and in 1992 the industry was rated as one of the top one hundred advertisers (Pechmann and Ratneshwar, 1994). However, there are high prices to pay - socially, economically, and personally - as a result of this industry. Annual mortality figures indicate that cigarette smoking is the number one cause of preventable death in the United States. An estimated 390,000 people die each year of smoke related illnesses, which is greater than the combined mortality for cocaine, crack, AIDS, homicide, suicide, and alcohol abuse (Botvin, G., Baker, Botvin, E., Dusenbury, Cardwell, and Diaz, 1993).

The younger the individual when they initially start smoking, the greater the possibility of addiction and becoming a lifelong smoker (King, 2015). Tobacco addiction is an issue the United States is struggling with, partially due to the fact that 90% of adult smokers began before or by the age of 18 (Ahmad, 2015). Researchers believe that since younger people become easily addicted to tobacco and older people have an easier time quitting tobacco product use, raising the minimum age for tobacco sales could prevent this addiction from spreading (Ahmad, 2015). Public opinion about tobacco use, the Tobacco 21 bill, California’s computer model, retail, and the comparison in impact between alcohol and tobacco purchasing ages are all considered

Tobacco intake one of the main source of death that could be avoided worldwide, taking lives of 6 million people yearly and to reach approximately 8 million death per year by 2020 globally. It is imperative to note that, tobacco smoking has never had a safe level and majorly increases the risk factor for utmost chronic illnesses including blood disease, stroke, protracted respiratory diseases and most of the cancer related diseases. Mass-produced of cigarettes have become most common type of tobacco consumed by many, with a daily sale of up to 15 billion cigarettes a day, other kinds (like chewing tobacco available in southern part of Africa, partly in Asia - known as Shisha and Middle East) most of them are common in particular areas. The study has shown that the life expectancy of a smoking person is always lessen by seven

Every teen may be too eager to become an adult since they know that it will allow them to have more freedom to do things on their own and to make their own decisions without the need for anyone’s approval. However, some teens may not feel like waiting for too long. Hence, some would do activities that would make them feel and look like adults. This is just one of the many reasons why teens choose to smoke at a young age. Notwithstanding the risks that smoking can do to their health, it can be an exhilarating experience for them to puff on that stick which they often see from other adults.

As a high school student I felt as though the positive outcomes would overpower the negatives, which I soon realized would not be the case. The peer pressure I felt from my friends who smoked also added to the reasoning behind my choice to try smoking during the initial stage of my high school experience. “Research suggests that children who smoke cause their non-smoking peers to take up the habit through strategies such as coercion, teasing, bullying and rejection from a desired group (Michell and West, 1996).” Being a student in my first year of high school I felt as though I didn’t know anyone’s true intentions. I felt pressure from older students who were talking to me and trying to influence me into smoking with them. Once I was a bit older I did a self-evaluation to understand that this decision that I was making was not because I truly wanted to, or felt the need to do, but rather the influence of my classmates and peers from the older grades. I felt as though my peers from the older grades needed to see me do this in order to be accepted into their social group. After coming to the conclusion that I would stop smoking and follow my own moral directions, one could argue I was then following categorical imperatives. Categorical imperatives is most simply understood as “a way of evaluating motives for actions (Henry, 2011).” I felt as though I had to follow my own personal moral compass as opposed to the morals set by my peers. Philosopher Immanuel Kant