Health: Young need help to kick the habit
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
Young people need better help to quit smoking ahead of the change in the tobacco buying age, anti-smoking charity Ash Scotland has said.
The charity wants youth workers and school nurses trained on what help is available locally for under 18s who wish to quit smoking. The legal age to buy cigarettes in Scotland will be raised from 16 to 18 on 1 October.
A spokeswoman for Ash Scotland said: "People like youth workers are ideally placed to help young people. If they're running a football team and someone is wheezing they can tell them why and where to get help."
Scotland's health minister Nicola Sturgeon said: "We are planning to publish a five-year smoking action plan next year, which will cover wide-ranging measures to dissuade young people from taking up smoking and helping those who want to quit."
Last week the doctors' union BMA Scotland published a five-point action plan to tackle teen smoking.
- www.bma.org.uk.
