An Australian group called Action Council on Smoking and Health (A CSH) has recently pushed for warnings on cigarette packets to be more graphic. They suggested graphic photos of diseases organs should cover at least 50% of the outside label. Additional health warnings with information s on how to quit and smoking risks should also be included inside the cigarette packet. Bland and ineffective warnings like “Smoking is a health hazard” and “Smoking reduces your fitness” already cover our cigarette packets in hope that they may deter smokers form their addiction.
This proposal has raised some questions that should be carefully considered. Are the current cigarette packet warnings really enough If so then why are 4 out of 5 drug associated deaths tobacco related If so then why are 1 out of 5 of our supposedly drug-aware generation of teenagers still ignoring such warnings and continuing to have a puff with their peers Obviously the during anti-smoking cigarette packet designs are not conveying their message effectively. Replacing those uninfluential warnings with hard-hitting, graphic photos will provide a powerful visual gorge to help smokers quit for the better. The current cautions on cigarette packets have little or no impact on the smoker.
Smokers are growing immune to warnings like “Smoking Causes heart disease” that was composed in 1994. This outdated campaign is focused on abstract tobacco related risks and illnesses that are interpreted by smokers in ways like, “This won’t happen to me” or “I can worry about it later.” Meanwhile, the new tactics is concentrated on the perspective of an individual smoker and the pictures show exactly what is happening to their body each time they smoke. This is related to the people’ own experience and is more likely to appeal and influence their behaviour rather than plain facts and figures. On average smokers handle their packets 20-30 times a day.
The Term Paper on Cigarette Smoking Among Teenagers
Whether they choose to light up their first cigarette on their own or are unwitting victims of passive smoking, Filipino youth are increasingly at risk from tobacco exposure. “The younger a child starts to smoke, the greater the chances of becoming a regular smoker,” said Dr Maricar Limpin, executive director of the non- government group Framework Convention on Tobacco Control Alliance ...
So if graphic pictures on cigarette packets were introduced, they would have 20-30 chances to face the harsh reality of what damage they are doing to themselves each time they light up. As we have all seen on television, in the recent graphic-TV-ad campaign, the middle-aged man lights up his cigarette in his car. We are next taken on a journey into his mouth and then met face to face with a gruesome eyeball staring straight at us, held open by surgical tweezers. We would rather not watch that commercial because of its daunting truth, “Smoking causes irreversible blindness.” Imagine handling a packet of cigarettes with that fearful eye staring into ours.
It is confronting. It is a disturbing reminder that has a lasting effect than “Smoking Kills” plainly printed on the packet. Along with the pictures on the outside label, additional warnings and helpful information should also be included with the packet of cigarettes. This is vital because even an ordinary packet of Panadol in your bathroom cabinet has displayed on the packet and on an extra insert, listing all the side effects of Panadol. This is ‘tobacco’ we are talking about here; Tobacco, the silent yet obnoxious murderer. ‘Tobacco’ the dried weed that contains the poisonous nicotine that we still accept even though it kills one in two of its users.
What this comes down to is consumer rights. Smokers have the right to know what they are inhaling, and what they are doing to themselves, but many do not. For this reason alone, the recommendation for more graphic pictures and warnings on cigarette packets should be seriously made allowance for.
