Tobacco Companies Target Teens

• In the State Tobacco Settlement of 1998, the tobacco industry agreed to stop targeting kids.  In the next two years they increased their marketing expenditures by 42 percent to a record $9.6 billion in 2000.
• This meant that the tobacco industry spent over $26 million a day on the marketing barrage to attract youth to its deadly products. The three most heavily advertised brands - Marlboro, Camel, and Newport - all preferred by 87 percent of youth. Less than half of all adults smoke these brands.
• Every day 5,000 kids under the age of 18 try their first cigarette.  Another 2,000 become regular, daily smokers; one-third of them will die prematurely as a result of their addictions.
• Smoking rates among male and female high school students are almost equal. Currently, 28.5 percent of all high school students are smokers.
• A new study reports that tobacco industry marketing undermines parents' efforts to prevent their children from smoking by associating smoking with independence, coolness, fun, and risk-taking.
• Good parenting practices, such as being actively involved in their kids' lives and setting age-appropriate limits, cut in half the risk that a teen will start smoking.

HELP TEENS ESCAPE

Take action. Join the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids.

www.tobaccofreekids.org