http://www.somosjovenes.cu/index/semana60/tabaquism.htm
Cuba strives to curb smoking
The need to reduce the
number of smokers can never be too stressed.
(Taken from
www.bbc.co.uk)
Ciego de Ávila province, May 29.- Despite Cuba’s constant educational campaign to reduce the number of smokers, there’s still a prevalence of 32% among people above the age of 15.
Held in the provincial capital, the Fifth National Anti-Smoking Conference announced the continuity of countrywide plans to design healthy lifestyles through multi-sectorial projects applicable to schools and communities alike.
Prevention work is especially aimed at teenagers –for they are most prone to undertake such a harmful habit– as well as at a more effective enforcement of the current legislation against smoking in public places or closed rooms shared by other people, as in a workplace.
Over a hundred experts on the subject who gathered at the national scientific meeting discussed a set of preliminary results of a study started in 1995 which shows smoking as Cuba’s first cause of death.
Due to be completed by 2020, this research makes it clear that smoking accelerates the appearance of peptic ulcers, emphysema, myocardial infarction and bronchial asthma, among other diseases.
As agreed by the delegates, the next conference will debate the experience gained in Ciego de Avila, one of the few Cuban provinces to register a reduction in the rate of smokers with a current 19,2 per every 100 inhabitants above 15. (AIN)
http://www.somosjovenes.cu/index/semana18/tabaquism.htm
Cuban women smoke on a par with men
A study made in 1999 covering around 80 countries placed Cuban women high on the list of smokers. Such prevalence has seen little or no change: research at municipal and national level has indicated that there’s hardly any difference between the number of women and men hooked by this harmful addiction.
Experts from the Epidemiological Division of the National Institute of Hygiene, Epidemiology and Microbiology reports that one of every four Cuban women is a smoker, a significant rate if we take into account not only tobacco’s damaging effects on health but also women’s role in setting an example within and acting as an agent of change for the family. This is a growing trend worldwide, mainly as a result of the increasing insertion of women into society and their consequent economic self-sufficiency.
Smoke if you will, but stay away from me
According to specialists, almost four of every 10 Cubans above 17 are smokers, which means there’s at least one in 80% of our households, not to mention passive smokers, either at home or any other enclosed space, for whom the risk is just as high. Nonsmokers, therefore, must defend their right to remain so, since –as one of the specialists said– “smoking is a free choice, but imposing it on someone else beside you is anything but”.
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