Tobacco use by Indian adolescents

Abstract

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Adolescents are the most vulnerable population to initiate tobacco use. It is now well established that most of the adult users of tobacco start tobacco use in childhood or adolescence. There has been a perceptible fall in smoking in the developed countries after realization of harmful effects of tobacco. The tobacco companies are now aggressively targeting their advertising strategies in the developing countries like India. Adolescents often get attracted to tobacco products because of such propaganda. There has been a rapid increase in trade and use of smokeless tobacco products in recent years in the country, which is a matter of serious concern to the health planners. It is important to understand various factors that influence and encourage young teenagers to start smoking or to use other tobacco products. The age at first use of tobacco has been reduced considerably. However, law enforcing agencies have also taken some punitive measures in recent years to curtail the use of tobacco products. This paper focuses on various tobacco products available in India, the extent of their use in adolescents, factors leading to initiation of their use, and the preventive strategies, which could be used to deal with this menace.</p

Knowledge, Attitude and Practice of Tobacco Use and Its Impact on Oral Health Status of 12 and 15 Year-Old School Children of Chhattisgarh, India

“…These findings are coinciding with that reported by Mukherjee et al (2012) in 2012. The perspectives, thus seen implies that knowledge related to tobacco use and its health impact in the present study was more in girls than boys which is again in constant with the finding reported by Mukherjee et al (2012) The youth is targeted by the tobacco industry effectively with the help of mass media by projecting smokers and tobacco chewers as trendy, sporty and super successful and thereby demonstrate tobacco consumption as a daily necessary routine (Chadda et al, 2002;Smith, 2006). The exposure to smoking in films is associated with the initiation of smoking has been reported in the United States both cross-sectionally (Sargent et al, 2001;Sargent et al, 2004) and prospectively (Dalton et al, 2003;Distefan et al, 2004).…”

“…With streaming modernization and rapid urbanization in India, use of tobacco is on the up rise among the girl students but still less as compared to the boys, this observation is also corroborated by the other Indian reports (Kapoor et al, 1995;Chadda et al, 2002;Reddy et al, 2005). Yet another mutagen found in easy reach of the school children was the betel nut/ areca nut which are a well known etiological agent for the causation of precancerous lesion: Oral Sub Mucous fibrosis (OSMF); a prevailing condition in the Asian subcontinent.…”

“…Use of tobacco amongst the children and adolescents is already a pandemic (Chadda et al, 2002). India accounts for the world's second largest tobacco production, which is the leading cause of death and each year it is estimated to kill approximately 5 million people worldwide (Deepa et al, 2012), and current trend shows that tobacco use will cause more than 8 million deaths annually by 2030 (Phinse et al 2013).…”

A comparative study on tobacco use among school boys in single sex and co-education school in Bengaluru

“…11 Chadda et al in their paper mention that the prevalence of tobacco use among boys varies between 6.9-22.5%. 12 In the present study we found the prevalence of tobacco use to be higher in all boys' school (25.7%) when compared to coeducation school (16.8%). Also, higher prevalence of smoking (9.8%), chewing (11.4%), both (4.5%) was found in boys school than in co-ed school (6.4%, 8.4%, 2% respectively).…”

Awareness of Harmful Effects of Tobacco –Misinterpretation or Misrepresentation

“…Among the various forms tobacco consumed, beedi was prevalent comparing with other forms, commonly preferred by older men from rural population because of the nominal cost and availability. This form of tobacco when compared with filtered cigarettes can cause severe irreparable damage to the lung alveolus with diseases such as Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) with scarring and difficulty in breathing 4 . Oral cancer was seen to follow lung cancer as a potential consequence of tobacco habits.…”