The Smoking Menace

In UK, children as young as ten are being given shopping vouchers worth £15 by the NHS to as an incentive quit smoking.

To quality, the youngsters must take a carbon monoxide test to prove they have kicked the habit and did not smoke for 28 days in order to earn the reward. This can then be used at reputed high street names to shop as they wish, hopefully not knives or fags.

Under the experimental scheme an additional £5 vouchers are being given out to pregnant teenagers trying to give up smoking. Shadow health secretary Andrew Lansley has criticized the initiative classifying it as a waste of money bearing the potential of even encouraging children to start smoking. ‘NHS money shouldn’t be used to bribe people to do the right thing,’ he added.

Statistics say six per cent of all children in England aged between 11 and 15 are smokers as well as 15 per cent of 15-year-olds. According to anti-smoking group ASH, The figure has come down from eight per cent of 11- to 15-year-olds before the smoking ban came in.

The reward scheme has been set up by NHS Brighton and Hove, which said ONE ten-year-old smoker was already trying to earn the £15.

Clearly the motive at the present is that if someone stops smoking when they are young they will feel the benefits immediately and saves the NHS millions of pounds in future expenses, as well as saving lives.

But while analyzing the state of affairs, Mr. Lansley’s criticism seems to be more relevant and thought provoking. The way the state benefits system is being exploited at present is an example.

All these initiatives are meant to be in public favour, but the public always has a tendency to tilt the results in their favour while continuing to stick to the menace. Teenage parenthood, for example, has become a means of earning easy money by many.

If selling cigarettes to the under aged is a crime under which the offender can be penalized and even having there trading license forfeited, then why not turn a tough hand on the other half of the offenders as well i.e. the SMOKERS?

Police officers don’t even have the power to forfeit the fags from the ineligible smokers leave alone taking any punitive action. So why not think of untying the hands of the law to curb this nuisance? Why not give more power to the police and the law enforcement agencies and passing tough sentences?