Schools Urged To Treat Teen Smokers With Nicotine Patch
Nicotine Patches and Chewing Gum
"Nicotine replacement therapy (NRT) isn't just for adults -- it's also an effective weapon for treating smoking addiction in teens. About 20 percent of high school students smoke, and half of adults who smoke develop an addiction by their 18th birthday, making adolescents an important target to kick the habit. While NRT product labels discourage NRT for teens, the latest medical guidelines recommend it as a safe and effective treatment option for them."
I am not disagreeing with you Kent,just doing some clarifications of what you said.
For purposes of clarity lets drop the distinction between underage and legal adult smoking
and consider that it is one homologous group. As a whole roughly only 30% of habitual smokers
will develop a dependency to smoking. This already discounts the roughly 40% who tried smoking
smoking and for whatever reason choose not to become regular users. I refer to those that would
be defined as regular users. Of the remaining regular smokers roughly 50% of these will quit smoking
between the ages of 30 to 40. Most of these quit for many reasons,health included though most are
not suffering from health issues and,health is just one of the many reasons they quit. Saving money,
the time involved in careers and raising children and,lack of appeal being some factors often cited.
It is important to remember 70% of smokers do not develop a dependency to smoking so many
who quit during this time frame do so with out any discomfort at all. I believe as the result of the
experiences of this age group all the bunk about superior will power and quitting came about but,
that's a different
thread. Now all that is left are the smokers who have not quit and in all probability never will in any significantly large percentage. Some will,most of these when its to late. I believe
this is where the 50% addiction figure would be accurate. Those that start smoking in their teens and
remain smokers into adulthood could not have an addiction rate of 50% as habitual smokers (regular
users) only have a dependency rate of 30%. It is also important to know the 30% dependency rate
is the highest known for any substance known to cause dependency. The one caveat being I do
not know how this compares to stuff that has been chemically enhanced or created in whole
in a lab.
Regards
Mike