Facts
*Every year an estimated 440000 American lives are taken
*Smoking costs the United States approximately $150 billion each year in health-care costs
*Cigarettes contain at least 43 distinct cancer-causing chemicals
*Smoking is directly responsible for 87 percent of lung cancer cases and causes most cases of emphysema and chronic bronchitis.
*Smoking in pregnancy accounts for an estimated 20 to 30 percent of low-birth weight babies, up to 14 percent of preterm deliveries, and some 10 percent of all infant deaths
*Only about 30 percent of women who smoke stop smoking when they find they are pregnant
*Children that have parents that smoke often have asthma, increased frequency of colds and ear infections, and sudden infant death syndrome
*Approximately 22.2 million American women are smokers
*Current female smokers aged 35 years or older are 12 times more likely to die prematurely from lung cancer than nonsmoking females
*More American women die annually from lung cancer than any other type of cancer; for example, lung cancer will cause an estimated 65,700 female deaths in 2002, compared with 39,600 estimated female deaths caused by breast cancer
*It is estimated that 4.5 million U.S. teenagers are cigarette smokers; 22.4 percent of high school seniors smoke on a daily basis. Approximately 90 percent of smokers begin smoking before the age of 21
*Nearly 70 percent of the U.S. workforce worked under a smoke-free policy in 1999 but the percentage of workers protected varies by state, ranging from a high of 89.3 percent in Utah to 48.7 percent in Nevada.
*Smokers become not only physically addicted to nicotine; they also link smoking with many social activities, making smoking a difficult habit to break
How the Meadia Influenes Smoking
The media influenes smoking many different ways that some people wouldn't even know that they are being influenesed. Some ways are:
*Billbordes,when you see that fancy billborde only showing that great life you will live it could make you want to be like that.
*Movies,When Brad Pitt walks in all hansome and smoking a ciggerate you thing gosh I wish I was him.
*If you're watching cartoons you could mistake them smoking as a joke and littler kids might want to smoke too.
*Music vidios show a lot of inappropriate behavior for there age group, such as smoking, drug use or even sexual activitie.
*Even walking down the street could be bad on your behalf,you could see others smoking or walk by a gas station and just want to try it once.
*The radio talks about all of the information that the music vidios did exept you arnt aware of what there doing so much because there isnt a clear picture in front of you. *Your family might smoke and you could look up to them so you might try it.
*Finnaly peer preasur e doesn't seem to be helping at school your friend might be smoking or even the "preps" could be smoking and of course you want to be cool too.
Some Useful Links
http://www.lungusa.org/
http://www.tobacco.org/
http://ash.org/
http://www.givingupsmoking.co.uk/votebox/default.asp?votechoice=no
http://quitsmoking.about.com/mbody.htm
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/smoking.html
http://kidshealth.org/kid/watch/house/smoking.html
http://www.4woman.gov/QuitSmoking/index.cfm
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