Smoked out

New tack needed in fight against youth smoking

One of the most troubling problems facing the medical community and social scientists in the United States is teen smoking. Economists, psychologists and doctors cannot come to a definitive conclusion on how to combat the rising number of young smokers. Well-publicized information about the adverse effects of smoking, from lung cancer to heart disease, does not seem to be deterring people from picking up the habit at an early age. The portion of high school seniors who reported smoking a cigarette in the past 30 days has gone from 27 percent in 1992 to 37 percent in 1997. In addition, smoking is on the rise at universities throughout the nation, with an increase in the smoking rate among college students from 22 to 29 percent over the past four years. These statistics are troubling and call the current methods used by the government and anti-smoking organizations to combat teen smoking into question. Perhaps a different tack is necessary.

The federal and state governments do not think so. With millions of dollars coming in from tobacco settlements, public health officials plan to mount an extensive advertising campaign over the next five years. The government will not be travelling down a new path with this strategy - in stead, they are using one that has proven expensive and possibly ineffective. Officials need to do more than tell people not to smoke in cheesy television ads and highway billboards. Young people find smoking intriguing because of the mystique, appearance and controversial nature surrounding it.

Education needs to be the focus of a serious campaign to curb youth smoking. An anti-smoking program, similar to the intense Drug Awareness Resistance Education program used to combat drug abuse by youths, needs to reach kids in every school throughout the country. A large portion of the tobacco settlement should be used for educational purposes that will help change the way kids, and society as a whole, view smoking.

Possible alternative solutions could be an increase in the enforcement of existing laws that prevent people under the age of 18 from buying tobacco products. These enforcement efforts should not target kids, though, since doing so would simply heighten the degree of notoriety that smoking has. Stores and vendors who sell the cigarettes should be the targets of such a campaign.

The tobacco bill that was pushed by U.S. Sen. John McCain (R-Arizona) and died this past year in the Senate should be revisited. At a bare minimum, the tobacco tax included in the defeated bill must be put into effect. Economists testifying before Congress this year empirically showed how young people - in contrast to adults - are more sensitive to changes in tobacco price and will be much less likely to purchase cigarettes if the price is higher. Previous attempts to combat the problem of teen smoking have had limited effect, evidenced by the still growing rate of teen smokers. If teen smoking rates are going to be reduced by an effective government campaign, it has to involve education and enforcement. Teaching kids about why smoking is bad as opposed to telling them not to smoke, prosecuting vendors who sell illegally to underage kids, and hiking up the price of cigarettes may not immediately solve the problem - but it could offer better results than the government's previous efforts.

12-03-98