Apollo Cancer Hospital launches 'Smoke & Win' Campaign

Apollo Cancer Hospital launches 'Smoke & Win' campaign with the message of Smoke at your own peril & end up winning a range of diseases

• Padma Bhushan Sri Pullela Gopichand launches the campaign

Hyderabad, May 28th, 2015: Apollo Cancer Hospitals, Hyderabad, launched a campaign 'Smoke & Win', on the eve of 'World No Tobacco Day' - 31st May, to wean away the youth from the self destructive habit of smoking. The Campaign was launched by Padma Bhushan Sri Pullela Gopichand, Renowned Badminton Coach. Ms. Pradnya Gadre, Ace Shuttler & Asian Games 2014 Medallist; Dr. Vijay Anand Reddy, Director, Apollo Cancer Hospital and Dr. Umanath Nayak, Consultant, Head & Neck Cancer Surgeon, Apollo Cancer Hospital, were present on the occasion. Ms. Pradnya Gadre demonstrated the ill effects of smoking to the gathering and some of the smokers participated in the contest on the occasion.

'Smoke & Win' an innovative campaign has an element of fun through a 'Wheel of Misery' to grab the attention of the youth and send a strong message of Smoke, but at your own peril and end up winning a range of dreaded diseases. The Wheel has slots of various diseases smoking can inflict on an individual like throat cancer, lung cancer, heart disease, impotency etc. Every time a smoker spins the wheel and the wheel stops at a particular disease, the participant will be educated on the disease and its repercussions by the concerned specialist, he will also be offered a free consultation by the specialist. This Campaign along with talks by eminent Doctors on harmful effects of smoking is being conducted by Apollo Cancer Hospitals for groups of IT employees most of whom are young and are patronising smoking in a big way.

This trend of youth picking up smoking habit can be disastrous leading to a huge disease burden on the country in the years to come and simultaneously impacting the economy, says Dr. P. Vijay Anand Reddy. Highlighting the grave need for curbing tobacco usage he said

¦ Nearly 2.4 crore people of Andhra Pradesh are using tobacco as per the data released by MoHFW and WHO last year.
¦ Eighty lacs of people in Andhra Pradesh will die prematurely through 27
¦ different tobacco related lethal diseases.
¦ Tobacco has been proven to be a confirmed cancer causing substance by WHO nearly 30 years back and there is no safe form or safe dosage of tobacco in the world.
¦ Revenue from tobacco is a fraction of the losses that eventually are directly attributable to its sequel. Andhra Pradesh has very low tax levels and less than several states in the country.
¦ Comprehensive Tobacco control is the single most cost effective, economically viable and practical approach to prevent this tragedy.
ome Facts about Tobacco usage in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh
1. Tobacco use in adults (age 15 years and above)
¦ 29.2 % use tobacco in any form
¦ 81% of the tobacco users are daily users of those who use in any form of tobaco
¦ 40 % are males and 19 % are females are current tobacco users.
2. Tobacco use in youth (age 13-15 years)
9 % of students currently use any form of tobacco and 7.1 % currently use other tobacco products.
8 % of never smokers are likely to initiate smoking next year Over 5 in 10 are exposed to smoke in public places and over 4 in 10 have parents wh smoke, chew or apply tobacco.
Over 8 in 10 smokers want to quit.
Over 7 in 10 students think smoking in public places should be banned.
Three - fourth of students think smoke from others is harmful to them.
3. Age at smoking initiation 6.8 % are initiating the tobacco use by <15 years 24% tobacco users initiated before the legal age (18 years)
4. Addiction
¦ 65.9 % daily tobacco users first use tobacco (smoke and smokeless) within 30 minute! after waking up.
5. Products used
¦ 17.4% adult use any smoked tobacco product, 11.1% use cigarettes and 6.8% use bidi,
¦ Bidi smokers smoke 11.1 bidi each day
¦ Cigarette smokers smoke 5.1 cigarettes each day.
¦ 15.1 % adults use smokeless forms while 17.4% smoke.
¦ Very high gutka use among males: 9.5 % to that of 5.5% use khaini or tobacco lime mixture among females.
6. Expenditure on tobacco products
¦ Cigarette smoker spends on average 363/- monthly and bidi smoker 113.30/- (higher than national average Rs.399.20/- & Rs.93.40/- respectively)
8. Knowledge of adverse health effects
¦ Though 86 % believe that smoking causes lung cancer, Only 43% and 63% believe that tobacco causes stroke/heart attack respectively
11. Cessation
¦ 55% of the smokers made quit attempt in last 12 months
¦ 51 % of the smokeless tobacco users made quit attempt in last 12 months
¦ Smoking quit rate is very low (less than 2%) and smokeless quit is less than 1 %
¦ 56 % of current smokers and 49 % current smokeless tobacco users have no plan to quit