The younger generation of today seems to be less interested in using tobacco as revealed by the World Health Organisation. The UN Health experts have that there was a decline in smoking by young men and boys.
Department of Health Promotion at the WHO director Dr Ruediger Krech said that it was the first time that the use of tobacco has seen a decline.
He said that there were slightly more than a billion users in 2018 and that there was much lesser number of young people who took to tobacco. He said that the WHO’s projection was that there would be about 2 million fewer young men who will use tobacco in 2020 and five million lesser by 2025. .
Stating that it was a a major development and a major shift in global tobacco usage, Krech said that the numbers also showed a decline in the use of tobacco by women. He said that the national policies, taxation and prohibition of smoking in public places have also resulted in the decline of number of smokers. Teh World health organisation maintained that the signs showed that tobacco usage can be reversed and it gave the governments the confidence that the usage could be reduced by 30 per cent by 2025.
It is estimated that more than eight million people die because of tobacco use every year. The WHO said that more than seven million deaths are from direct tobacco use and about 1.2 million deaths are caused by second hand smoking.
It also said that the most deaths were recorded in low and middle class income countries. The agency said that about 60 per cent of countries have shown a decline in the number of tobacco users. Though there was a slight progress in the reduction of tobacco usage, the Krech said that this was not a thing of satisfaction when looking at the number of deaths because of the usage.
WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said that this was a good trend and a turning point against tobacco use. He also said that the agency was working with the governments to bring down the use of tobacco.
