Jun 22, 2015 | Press Release |
Buckinghamshire County Council is participating in a national project to help stop young people from starting to smoke and their parents/carers to quit.
QUIT, the UK charity is rolling out Smoke Free Family Life across the country including Buckinghamshire, the county where the project originated.
A QUIT Youth Presenter is working with local schools to deliver presentations to pupils as well as giving out booklets that include details of local stop smoking support for parents or other family members. Booklets that aim to educate the children and young people about the harms of smoking are also being given out.
The project is being evaluated by University College London as part of a nationwide evaluation to identify how using a whole family approach to educating young people on the harms of smoking, helps to reduce the numbers of young people starting to smoke and increases the number of adult smokers quitting. The project aims to give young people the facts about smoking so that they can make an informed choice as well as supporting parents/carers who smoke to stop. The project is being run in partnership with the Buckinghamshire stop smoking service.
Councillor Patricia Birchley says:
“We are delighted to be able to support this project, which aims to help our young people make informed choices about smoking. We know that smoking causes around 600 deaths in our county each year and contributes to many long and short term illnesses, such as emphysema and heart disease. We want to tackle this problem by supporting projects that provide the right information to young people and their families about the real risks of tobacco use.” For further information about local stop smoking support visit www.smokescape.org or call 0845 27 07 222
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