Tobacco Abuse Statistics White adolescents have the highest smoking rates. African American adolescents have the lowest smoking rates. For all ethnicities combined, adolescent smoking rates progressively increase from the 9th to the 12th grade. Since 1992, the smoking rate has risen by more than 20% among high school students (National High School Senior Survey, commissioned by the National Institute on Drug Abuse). At least 3.1 million adolescents and 25 percent of seventeen and eighteen year-olds are current smokers. 80 to 90 percent of smokers begin smoking before they're twenty. Tobacco is often the first drug used by young people who go on to use alcohol, marijuana, and other drugs. Cigarette smokers have more than double the risk of having a heart attack than a non-smoker. They also have two to four times the risk of cardiac arrest (Complete heart failure). The earlier the person starts smoking the greater the risk to his or her health. Heart disease can begin in the teens if those are the years that a person starts to smoke. By giving up smoking, the risks of heart disease reduce rapidly. It is estimated that smoking will be responsible for the premature death (before age 70) of 51% of young women smokers now aged 15, if they continue to smoke. Why Teenage Women Choose to Smoke: Many young women make the decision to begin smoking because they believe that it will make them appear to be absolutely fantastic. They believe that it will make them appear cooler, make them thinner, thus make their popularity soar. However, on the contrary, smoking cigarettes may cause irreversible damage to your health, as well as cause you to be very “uncool”. Besides causing internal problems, many of the “ on-the-surface” negatives include: Bad breath, yellowing teeth, and the constant odor of cigarette smoke clinging to the body. Who wants to be around someone who smells constantly and even puts them in harms way? Second-hand smoke contains even more toxins than the actual smoke the user is inhaling. Young women also make the decision to begin smoking because of peer-pressure (“everyone is smoking, maybe I should start”). This is not a reason to begin anything! We need to learn to stand up to what we think is right, and choose the correct decision, not the unhealthy one. Just the Facts: Segments of “Dakota” a compilation by RJ Reynolds    An internal marketing plan code named “Dakota” revealed that cigarette companies were planning to market to “ Virile Females” between the ages of 18 to 24 who had no education beyond high school and who watched soap operas and attended tractor pulls.    During 1990 the Interagency Committee on Smoking and Health meeting chaired by the Surgeon General, the Dakota marketing plan was called a “deliberate focus on youth women of low socioeconomic status who are at high risk of pregnancy.”    The target market for Dakota happens to be the one group of women where smoking rates have declined the least and this is most likely to continue during pregnancy. (This information was found at: http://www.amhrt.org/Heart_and_Stroke_A_Z_Guide/tobta.html) Do You Need Help? Please speak to a doctor in your area for possible medications and for guidance to help you through the difficult time of quitting. The following resources may be to your benefit as well. Good Luck and stay healthy! The following resources will take you out of our site. Use your BACK button (in the top left corner of your browser) to return here. Online Addiction Resources: http://www.camh.net/addiction/online_resources.html Tobacco Use By Children http://www.who.int/inf-fs/en/fact197.html Adolescents: Smoking and Quitting http://www.cctc.ca/sff/docs/adolesc.htm For More Information on Quitting… http://www.bu.edu/cohis/smoking/resource/moreinfo.htm Home