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World Cup Joins International Efforts To Fight Smoking
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105 million youths in East Asia and the Pacific risk dying due to smoking-related diseases |
GENEVA,
June 1 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - The World Health
Organization’s (WHO) World No Tobacco Day on Friday prompted a
series of efforts worldwide to encourage people to stop smoking and
drive down the estimated four million deaths a year linked to smoking,
news agencies reported.
Football's World Cup in South Korea and Japan, which began Friday,
took the lead attempts to turn major sports gatherings into
non-smoking events by inaugurating new bans on smoking in stadiums.
But outside the 2002 World Cup venues, large numbers of Japanese and
Koreans, amongst the heaviest smokers in the world according to WHO,
were seen puffing away in bars shortly before the opening match in
Seoul, reported Agence France-Presse (AFP).
In France -- whose football team suffered a shock defeat in the
opening World Cup match against Senegal -- Parisians had the chance to
have their blood pressure tested while they watched the match on a
giant screen outside city hall.
Meanwhile,
Greek authorities used World No Tobacco Day to take the same step as
France a decade ago. They announced measures to restrict smoking in
public places and limit tobacco advertising.
South Africa's Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang decided to
reinforce a 2001 law to stop smoking in restaurants, with stiffer
penalties for those who light up.
In Cyprus, drivers may be fined 48 dollars from now on if they are
caught smoking with an under 16 year-old inside the car.
But Turkish Health Minister Osman Durmus approached the problem from a
different angle, by awarding 3,000 euros (2,800 dollars) to one of a
group of 100,000 smokers who officially kicked the habit since the
beginning of May.
Turkey has the highest density of smokers in the world, according to
the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). More
than 67 percent of the population is thought to smoke.
In Mexico city, Tobacco ads will be banned from Mexican radio and
television as of 2003, Health Minister Julio Frenk announced Friday.
"If
we don't act energetically and if current trends continue, between
today and 2010 our country will have racked up half a million deaths
from tobacco consumption," Frenk said.
The
European Commission on Thursday, kicked off a three-year,
multi-million euro campaign to keep 12 to 18 year olds from getting
hooked on smoking.
Pegged
to the start of the "smoke-free" World Cup football
tournament opening in Seoul and World No-Smoking Day, both on Friday,
the campaign features well-known soccer stars in an EU-wide media
campaign to dispel smoking's "cool" image.
Health and Consumer Safety Commissioner David Byrne said over 80
percent of today's smokers got hooked on the habit between the ages of
12 and 18.
"This is a choice issue," he told a press conference.
"It is easier to make the choice (to smoke or not) before you
become hooked on nicotine. (But) let's face it, a young boy or girl
you gets hooked by nicotine no longer has a real choice."
According to the WHO, as many as 105 million youths in East Asia and
the Pacific risk dying in their middle or old age due to
smoking-related diseases.
The
Manila-based WHO Western Pacific Region office said Tuesday that
cigarette smoking was catching on swiftly with the region's youth,
with 40,000 to 50,000 more teens in Asia taking up smoking everyday.
"At
current rates, about a quarter of youths may die from smoking in WHO's
Western Pacific Region," it said in a statement ahead of World No
Tobacco day on Friday.
Much to the anger of anti-tobacco groups, Nico Water, a a bottled
water spiked with nicotine, that promises to let smokers gulp down
their next fix, will be sold in U.s. stores starting July.
The
water, will be sold in packs of four bottles for about 15 dollars, and
is being marketed as a supplement to smoking.
The
owner of the patent, a California-based QT5 Inc, argues that as a
supplement the product does not require approval from the U.S. Food
and Drug Administration (FDA).
"There are 38 million smokers out there, we want to give them
another choice that is easy for them to access and eliminate
second-hand smoke," QT5 chief executive Steve Reder said.
His company's Internet site describes it as a "convenient
nicotine beverage."
"It's a healthy breather with Nico Water that provides a
refreshing break to the smoking habit and the craving for nicotine
when not smoking for an hour, a day, a week or a lifetime," it
boasts.
The Islamic ruling on smoking is that it is haram (prohibited) for
Muslims because of the hazards its poses for the person’s health and
those around him.
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