Smoking by Teenagers May Be On the Rise for the First Time in Decades

According to a report just released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the decades long decline in smoking among Americans has failed to decline for the past 3 years. Even more worrisome is that the pattern of decline has also stalled among  high school students. In fact, some are analyzing the data along with the introduction of the Camel 9 by RJR Nabisco and are concluding that smoking is on the rise among high school seniors.

Since 2004, there has been no decline in the percentage of Americans smoking. About 20.8 percent of American adults are smokers. Out of that percentage, 36.3 million are smoking every day.

Corinne Husten, head of the epidemiology branch of the CDC’s Office on Smoking and Health pointed our two reasons for the data trends. First, cigarette companies have increased advertising to increase revenues to offset tax increases. Second, there have been massive decreases in the budgets for some very effective anti-smoking campaigns.

William V. Corr, Xxecutive Director of the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids blamed the Bush Administration for the worrisome data

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