Categories
Latest News
-
Targeted Against Gangs
24th March 2014
-
Keep Safe This Summer
16th July 2014
-
College Fresher's Fair
24th September 2014
-
Stoptober
1st October 2014
-
Half Term Kick-Off Session
28th October 2014
6 Reasons to Never Touch a Cigarette!
Article Date: 6th December 2016
Many teenagers are lured by peer pressure to start smoking. They are made to feel by their classmates and friends that it’s cool to sport a ‘fag dangling from your mouth.’ As a direct result of such pressure, it is estimated that 90 % of smokers take their first drag before the age of 19.
Moreover, your friends might tell you that all the health warnings are just nonsense and their great grandfather has been smoking since World War II without any ill effects.
Please don’t let such people fool you or force you into doing something that is extremely harmful for your health.
Smoking is a dirty and dangerous habit that in the long run can and certainly will hurt you, and simply thinking that you are ‘too young to worry about side effects’ is not going to change the fact that they will affect you and not just in later life but almost as soon as you take up smoking. Here is how:
1. Bad odour
Smokers emit a foul smoky odour every time they smoke. In fact, the longer they keep on smoking, the more the smell clings to them and all the change of clothes and showers is not going to make it go away.And let’s face it; not make people would want to go out with someone who smells of stale smoke all the time!
2. Yellow teeth and nails
Smokers often have different toothpastes and toothbrushes for a reason. The smoke stains the pearly whiteness of your teeth into a dull yellow colour and does the same for your fingers as well.
3. Smoking is a gateway to other addictions
Peer pressure is often not an easy thing to resist, and once you go that way the chances are many of your so called “friends” would want to ‘experiment’ further, with alcohol, hash, cannabis all the way down to hard drugs such as cocaine and even heroin. And climbing out of that hole is not going to be easy at all, unless of course you refuse to take that first step.
4. Shortness of breath
Smoking robs you of your natural vitality and stamina. You will find huffing and puffing in the first quarter of a soccer match when you used to handle the entire match without getting tired.
5. Cancer
Irrespective of what your friends and school mates say, the warning labels on cigarette packs have been put there for a reason. Smoking does cause both lung and mouth cancer and that dread disease is one of the most difficult to recover from, amongst all the illnesses in the world.
6. Cigarettes are highly addictive
The nicotine in cigarettes creates its own addiction. The more you smoke, the more difficult it is to quit. In fact, the odds are there will come a time in your life when you would be desperate to quit but would not know how to go about it, so intense would be the nicotine cravings.
The only way of dealing with people who want you to smoke is a resounding “NO”. Period... full stop! Remember, if they really like you they would not want to force you into doing something that is so harmful to your health. Stay away from such people as much as possible.
