Youth, stop smoking now

“ Oh ! So much smoke!! Help! Who can help me? I’m buried by smoke….qu ..quick…where is fresh air ? Help me please!” 

Don’t worry, there is no fire. However, it is not exaggerating to say that this killer is even more hazardous  than fire. Every year, tobacco leads to the death of four millions people in the world. In other words, every day, eleven thousand people die because of the illness caused by smoking. Among two of those who continue to smoke since they are teenagers, one will eventually die because of the related illness such as lung cancer, heart disease and stroke etc. In order to prevent our future pillars from falling into the smoking traps, in this essay, I’m going to examine the causes and suggest some measures to prevent youth from smoking.

In order to prevent smoking among youth effectively, efforts have to be paid to find out their reasons why they smoke. Teenagers think smoking is no big deal is that they have a wrong sense of value. They don’t cherish their life. Although they know that smoking brings adverse effects  health, they don’t care about it. They think that these are their lives and they have the right to choose their lifestyle. In view of this, visiting hospitals is one of the activities that are suitable for them. When teenagers visit hospitals, they can experience the atmosphere of suffering illness. When they look at a patient who suffers from heart disease due to family illness, teenagers know how hard a  patient tries  to maintain a sound body. Since this is a family illness, the patient does not have a chance to choose his own destiny , but he still does  his best to follow doctors’ instructions. However, youth can have a chance to choose a healthy life, why can’t we grasp the chance and decline smoking?

Apart from having wrong value, youth smokers think it is impossible or very difficult to quit smoking. It is understandable why those who think to quit smoking is impossible will continue to smoke. However, why will those who think to quit smoking is easy but they still keep on smoking? This is because they think that they can quit smoking whenever they want. Since they think they can quit smoking at any time, they do not worry about the adverse effect of smoking. In light of this, visiting Hong Kong Smoking Cessation Health Center would make youth smokers think no more that it is impossible to quit smoking, as there are still many successful cases. But they will not think quit smoking is easy too, since they will know more about how to quit smoking as well as the difficulties of quitting  smoking. Participants of the center may also be willing to share their experience with the youth, so that teenagers will have a right attitude towards quit smoking.

Apart from that, being susceptible to peers  , parents and idols are also the main reason for youth to smoke. This is because youth may not be mature enough to judge right and wrong intelligently, they are susceptible to what the others do or say. Since  they do not have much experience, they may not know the serious consequence of smoking very clearly. As a result, when their friends ask them to try smoking or if their parents are also smokers, they may intend to smoke out of curiosity. To prevent youth from smoking, parents should set a good example to their children. Besides not to smoke  parents should also tell children about the hazard of smoking since they are small, so that the message of not to smoke  can penetrate into the mind of children deeply. On the other hand, since Hong Kong teenagers are susceptible to what their idols do, the singers and actors  should behave well, so that they would not set a bad example to their fans. Those who engaged in films and television program production should also stop showing characters who are always carrying cigarettes, disseminate messages that the one who smoke is more superior than others. The government can also help to prevent smoking by legislation. For example, smoking is prohibited in flights . When  smokers take long distance trips, they have to stop smoking for a number of hours. This may help smokers to gain confidence that they have the ability to quit smoking!

No matter what we do, the most important drive  to stop youth from smoking are the teenagers themselves. When they have a right sense of value and insist not to smoke, no one can affect them. They may even participate in persuading their friends not to smoke. Therefore, we should let them know about the hazard of smoking, such as the bad effect on the health of themselves as well as the others, pollution problems etc. When we present this information to them,  drama competition can be held to let teenagers participate in reflecting  the lives of smokers, essay competition can be arranged to let them think more deeply about the hazard of smoking. In this way, teenagers are more willing to pay attention to the issue. Youth are our pillars of future, why can’t we help them to develop a healthy life?