Saudi Gazette Parents in the town of Najran were outraged after they saw some mini-markets selling children's toys that looked exactly like cigarette packs. These small plastic toys that have the logo and pictures of cigarettes were innocently picked up by children and they wanted to buy them and play with them. Such toys will confuse the children and reduce the positive influence of the public informational advertisements and signs that are part of the national anti-smoking campaign, Ali Al-Quraish, a student counselor at a local school told Al-Watan newspaper. A child who receives contradicting messages usually ends up adopting undesired behavior. For example, if a mother hits her daughter while telling her not to hit her brother, the daughter will most probably hit other children. Likewise, we warn children about the health dangers of smoking, yet parents themselves smoke and now markets are selling toys that look like cigarette packs. A study by researchers at Dartmouth College revealed that children with parents who smoke were four times more likely to purchase cigarettes, as compared to children whose parents are non-smokers. Children are highly attentive to their parents' smoking habits, and are more likely to regard smoking as appropriate and normal behavior. Findings of the Student Health Survey 2006, conducted by the Health Promotion Board (HPB), showed that a significantly higher percentage of youth smokers (59 percent) had at least one parent who smoked, as compared to the non-smokers (34 percent). The increase in the tendency of children to smoke later in life is not due to some genetic factor. They adopt the habit by emulation and having toy cigarette packs will make matters worse as such toys will portray a familiar and positive image of cigarettes. Therefore, these toys must be recalled and banned in the future. Smoking prevention may prove to be a very difficult task, especially when one can find products that actually promote smoking. One of these products is the mobile phone that looks like a Marlboro cigarette pack. Advertised and sold over the internet, this particular phone has a flip-top box and a place for storing cigarettes. The Marlboro 508 phone is a standard low-end cell phone, featuring a 1.6-inch screen, and MP3/MP4 player, blue tooth, FM radio, and camera. __
