When a report comes out that 40 percent of secondary students in the Eastern Province regularly smoke cigarettes, alarm bells should be going off across the land that something drastic must be done to address the problem of tobacco smoking in the Kingdom. It would be entirely unacceptable if 40 percent of Kingdom residents were found to be smokers but when that statistic applies only to young people, most of whom reportedly began smoking before the age of 10, it is both shocking and disgusting. For years cigarette makers maintained that the link between smoking and lung and other types of cancer not to mention emphysema and heart disease, was unproven. Such claims of a lack of evidence, however, are ancient history and there is no responsible physician or researcher who would maintain such a stance with a straight face today. As is so effectively illustrated in the film, The Insider, up until the 1990s, tobacco companies considered cigarettes as “nicotine delivery devices” and manipulated the levels of the addictive chemical in order to more easily hook smokers and keep them coming back for more. Cigarettes have long lost any reasonable character of sophistication and “cool.” The time has come for the Kingdom to follow the examples of other countries who have implemented programs to curtail smoking. Massive education campaigns must be undertaken. Enforced restrictions on smoking in public places and restaurants must also be implemented. Finally, and most effectively, cigarettes should be heavily taxed so that the price of cigarettes becomes prohibitive for the normal consumer. There must also be strictly enforced age limits for smoking and heavy penalties for those, either retailers or acquaintances, who provide underage smokers with cigarettes. There is no excuse for anyone providing someone under the age of 10 – or even the age of 18 – with proven carcinogens. The toll of cigarettes is taken not only on the individual smoker but on the health system, as well. The huge sums of money necessary to treat cancer victims could easily be reduced with enforced restrictions on tobacco use. It is not just for the betterment of society but for its very survival. __
