Tuesday, November 3, 2009

INTRODUCTION HISTORY OF SMOKING

Smoking is one of the most common forms of recreational drug use. Tobacco smoking is today by far the most popular form of smoking and is practiced by over one billion people in the majority of all human societies. Less common drugs for smoking include cannabis and opium. Some of the substances are classified as hard narcotics, like heroin and crack cocaine, but the use of these is very limited as they are often not commercially available.

The history of smoking dates back to as 5000 BC in shamanistic rituals. Many ancient civilizations, such as the Babylonians, Indians and Chinese , burnt incense as part of religious rituals , as did the Israelites and the later Catholic and Orthodox Christian churches. Smoking in the Americas probably had its origins in the incense-burning ceremonies of shamans but was later adopted for pleasure or as a social tool. The smoking of tobacco and various other hallucinogenic drugs was used to achieve trances and to come into contact with the spirit world.

Religious leaders have often been prominent among those who considered smoking immoral or outright blasphemous. In 1634 the Patriarch of Moscow forbade the sale of tobacco and sentenced men and women who flaunted the ban to have their backs whipped until skin came off their backs. The Western church leader Urban VII likewise condemned smoking in a papal bull of 1590 .despite many concerted efforts, restrictions and bans were almost universally ignored. When James 1 of England, a staunch anti-smoker and the author of a Counterblast to tobacco, tried to curb the new trend by enforcing a whooping 4000% tax increase on tobacco in 1604, it proved a failure, as London had some 7000 tobacco sellers by the early 1600s.Later, scrupulous ruler would realize the futility of smoking bans and instead turned tobacco trade and cultivations into lucrative government monopolies.

By the mid-1600s every major civilization had been introduced to tobacco smoking and in many cases had already assimilated it into the native culture, despite the attempts of many rulers to stamp the practice out harsh penalties of fines. Tobacco, both product and plant, followed the major trade routes to major ports and markets , and then on into the hinterlands. The English language term smoking was coined in the late 1700s, before then the practice was referred to as drinking smoke.

Tobacco and cannabis were used in Sub- Saharan Africa, much like elsewhere in the world, to confirm social relations but also created entirely new ones. In what is today Congo , a society called Bena Diemba ( People of Cannabis ) was organized in the late 1800 in Lubuko ( The land Of friendships ) .The Bena Diemba were collectivist pacifists that rejected and herb medicines in favor of cannabis.

The growth remained stable until the American Civil War in 1860s , from which the primary labor force transition from slavery to share cropping. This compounded with a change in demand , lead to the industrialization of tobacco production with the cigarette. James Bonsack , a craftsman , in 1881 produce a machine to speed the production in cigarettes.

Monday, September 7, 2009

DISCUSSION GROUP ENGLISH FOR SOCIAL SCIENCES

Our group has a discussion on 6 September 2009. In discussion we have more opinion and suggestion to create are best topics.

To Identify Smoker in Malaysia

There are at least 1.7 million smokers in Malaysia. One in every 5 Malaysia aged 15 years and above is a smoker. A study by the Ministry of Youth and Sports in 1994 on 6,000 youths showed that 71 percent has experimented with cigarettes. A recent survey showed that 85 percent of smokers were aged between 19 and 22 years.
In total consumption increased by 57 percent over the period 1965-1984, an average of 3 percent per annum. An estimated 17 billion sticks of cigarettes is currently
[1990] consumed, worth US$530 million [US$1.00=RM2.50].

According to 1996 Ministry of Health Survey, there were 2.4 million smokers in Malaysia, the number of male smokers had increased from: 41.0% in 1986 to 49.2% in 1996. In the past 10 years, smoking related deaths comprised three out of the five main killers in Malaysia

Male students smoked an average of 24.3 cigarettes per week. About 14% of them reported that they are addicted to cigarettes. Male students whose father smoked, were 1.81 times more likely to be a smoker compared to those whose father did not.
Smoking habits among school teachers: 40.56% (None of the female teachers smoked). About 64% of the smokers started to smoke before 14 years of age. About 59% smoked more than 10 cigarettes per day. About 67% of the smokers thought of quitting smoking. Of those 72% had tried at least once.

To Identify Factor Why One of Person Like Smoker

A lot of people in this country choose to smoke and have often wondered why they would want do so in the first place. Unlike a few decades ago, it is no secret that smoking is very hazardous to your health. Heart disease, cancer, increased risk of heart attacks and lower immune systems are the most serious consequences. Yet, millions of people voluntarily fill their lungs with carcinogens and pay hundreds or even thousands of dollars a year in the process. There are many people trying to quit. But why start smoking and why are there so many who seem oblivious to the effects on their health? What is so attractive about smoking that people will risk destroying their health and cutting their lives short?

Some people probably think they would rather sacrifice a few years of their life since the extra time would be no good to them if they can't smoke.

Why do people start to smoke? There are some factors that contribute of smoking ;-

1. ADDICTED
People have to start smoking in the first place, the majority of them quickly become addicted and continue to smoke for a long period of time. Some manage to quit, probably after many unsuccessful attempts, whilst other will smoke for the rest of their lives, however, that over 50% of smokers wish that they didn't smoke and that could give up tomorrow. Therefore, it should be apparent that most people smoke because they are addicted to nicotine.The reality is that it doesn't take long to become addicted to nicotine and smoking. Within a short period of time, children can experience the same cravings and withdrawal symptoms as an adult, as well as smoke as many cigarettes or more.

2. GROWN UP IN SMOKING ENVIRONMENT
There are several reasons as to why children or teenagers start smoking. The children may have started smoking as they have grown up in an environment where their parents, grandparents or older sibling smoke, so they smoke in order to look and act like them.

3. ACT OF DEFIANCE AGAINST THEIR PARENTS
Other children start smoking as an act of rebellion or defiance against their parents or people of authority.

4. LOW SELF ESTEEM
Smoking may get children in with the "in crowd"and help them to make friends. If they smoke, they will be accepted by their peers.

5. APPEAR OLDER
Some children have said that they smoke to apper older and more grown up, especially if they are surrounded by young adults who smoke.

6. FAVOURITE IDOL
Some teenagers may take up smoking because their favourite film star or pop star smokes. They may think that if they smoke just like their favourite idol does, then they will appear more glamours, attractive or sexy, just like them.

7. PEER PRESSURE
Many children start smoking because their friends have tried it or smoke themselves.

8. ADVERTISEMENT
The manner in which some tobacco companies advertise their cigarette brand also has a majur influence on young people. Some adverts give the impression that smoking is sociable. You can make new friends by smoking or you can attract your ideal partner by looking sexy, sultry and smoky.

9. TO COPE WITH STRESS AND NERVES
A lot of people think that they need cigarettes in order to cope with stress or nerves. However, nicotine is stimulant, it makes your heart beat faster and raises your blood pressure. So in fact smoking does not really relax you at all.

10. HABIT
A lot of people are used to smoking that they do it out of habit and they don't even really want a cigarette some of the time. For example, you may light up a cigarette when you do certain activities in particulars, such as talking on the phone, reading the paper or watching television. If you are not allowed to smoke at work, you may therefore have a cigaratte before you start, during a break, before lunch, after lunch and as soon as you leave.

11. STARTING A CONVERSATION
As with the younger generation, smoking may be a way of talking to different people and making new friends.Asking someone for a light or a cigarette may be a way of starting a conversation or an ice breaker.

12. BORED AND LONELY
Some people smoke if they are bored and have nothing to do or if they are feeling lonely. Trying to keep busy would perhaps be a more satisfactory solution to this problem.

Just stops the withdrawal symptoms that have begun to kick in after not having one for a while. If you live with a family member or partner who smokes, then obviously it is going to be much harder to quit, even though you may really want to. Many women are afraid of giving up smoking as they think that they will gain a huge amount of weight when they stop. Once you stop smoking though, you will be much fitter and have much more energy, which could motivate you into taking up some form of exercise or joining a gym.

Whatever the reasons people have to start smoking in the first place, the majority of them quickly become addicted and continue to smoke for a long period of time. Some manage to quit, probably after many unsuccessful attempts, whilst others will smoke for the rest of their lives, however long or short that may be. It is a fact however, that over 50% of smokers wish that they didn't smoke and that they could give up tomorrow. Therefore, it should be apparent that most people smoke because they are addicted to nicotine. For them, not to smoke would need an immense amount of willpower, a huge amount of support from family and friends and for some, expert medical advice and help.

copyright from 2005-2009 www.helpwithsmoking.com

Effect of Smoking

Side Effects of Smoking Cigarettes•Every year hundreds of thousands of people around the world die from diseases caused by smoking - Smoking KILLS.•One in two lifetime smokers will die from their habit. Half of these deaths will occur in middle age.•Tobacco smoke also contributes to a number of cancers.•The mixture of nicotine and carbon monoxide in each cigarette you smoke temporarily increases your heart rate and blood pressure, straining your heart and blood vessels. •This can cause heart attacks and stroke. It slows your blood flow, cutting off oxygen to your feet and hands. Some smokers end up having their limbs amputated.•Tar coats your lungs like soot in a chimney and causes cancer. A 20-a-day smoker breathes in up to a full cup (210 g) of tar in a year.•Changing to low-tar cigarettes does not help because smokers usually take deeper puffs and hold the smoke in for longer, dragging the tar deeper into their lungs.•Carbon monoxide robs your muscles, brain and body tissue of oxygen, making your whole body and especially your heart work harder. Over time, your airways swell up and let less air into your lungs.•Smoking causes disease and is a slow way to die. The strain of smoking effects on the body often causes years of suffering. Emphysema is an illness that slowly rots your lungs. People with emphysema often get bronchitis again and again, and suffer lung and heart failure.•Lung cancer from smoking is caused by the tar in tobacco smoke. Men who smoke are ten times more likely to die from lung cancer than non-smokers.•Heart disease and strokes are also more common among smokers than non-smokers. •Smoking causes fat deposits to narrow and block blood vessels which leads to heart attack. •Smoking causes around one in five deaths from heart disease. •In younger people, three out of four deaths from heart disease are due to smoking.•Cigarette smoking during pregnancy increases the risk of low birth weight, prematurity, spontaneous abortion, and perinatal mortality in humans, which has been referred to as the fetal tobacco syndrome.

Medical Treatment

Smoking is the worst of all habits and can be really difficult to give up. But if you really want to quit smoking and are serious about it, go for a safe smoking cessation treatment. Most people can not quit smoking mainly because of the headaches and tension they fell when they try to quit smoking. These feelings can be attributed to withdrawal symptoms.

Your decision to quit smoking will yield many benefits such as :

a) live longer and better
b) lower your chances of having a heart attack, stroke, or cancer
c) improve your chances of having a healthy baby
d) save people you live with especially your children
e) more money to spend on things other then cigarettes

Quitting is not easy. Every year, 34% of all smokers try to quit, but only about 2.5%succeed.

There are a wide range of alternative treatments that can help a smoker quit the habit. The treatments including hypnotherapy, herbs, acupuncture and meditation. For example, a controlled trial demonstrated that self-massage can help smokers crave less intensely, smoker fewer cigarettes, and in some cases completely give them up.

Hypnotherapy

Hypnotherapy helps the smoker achieve a trance-like state, during which the deepest levels of the mind are accessed. A session with a hypnotherapist may begin with a discussion of whether the smoker really wants to and truly has the motivation to stop smoking. The therapist will explain how hypnosis can reduce the stress-related symptoms that sometimes come with kicking the habit.

Often the therapist will discuss the danger of smoking with the patient and begin to “reframe” the patient’s thinking about smoking. Many smoker are convinced they can’t quit, and the therapist can help persuade them that they can change this behavior. These suggestions are then repeated while the smoker is under hypnosis. The therapist may also suggest while the smoker is under hypnosis that his feelings of worry, anxiety, and irritability will decrease.

Aromatherapy

The vapor black pepper extract can reduce symptoms associated with smoking withdrawal. Other essential oils can be used for relieving the anxiety a smoker often experiences while quitting.

Herbs

A variety of herbs can help smokers reduce their cravings for nicotine, clam their irritability, and even reverse the oxidative cellular damage done by smoking. Herbs that can help relax a smoker during withdrawal include wild oats and kava-kava. To reduce the oral fixation supplied by a nicotine habit, a smoker can chew on licorice root- the plant, not the candy. Licorice is good for the liver, which is a major player in the body’s detoxification process. Licorice also acts s a tonic for the adrenal system, which helps reduce stress. And there’s an added benefit : if a smoker tries to light up after chewing on licorice root, the cigarette tastes like burned cardboard. Other botanicals that can help repair free-radical damage to the lungs and cardiovascular system are those high in flavonoids, such as hawthorn, gingko, biloba and bilberry.

Acupuncture

This ancient Chinese method of healing is used commonly to help beat addictions, including smoking. The acupuncturist will use hair-thin needles to stimulate the body’s qi, or healthy energy. Acupuncture is a sophisticated treatment system based on revitalizing qi, which supposedly flows through the body in defined pathways called meridian. During an addiction like smoking, qi isn’t flowing smoothly or gets stuck, the theory goes. Points in the ear and feet are stimulated to help the smoker overcome his addictions. Often the acupuncturist will recommend keeping the needles in for five to seven days to calm the smoker and keep him balanced.

Vitamins

Smoking seriously depletes vitamin C in the body and leaves it more susceptible in infections. Vitamin C can prevent or reduce free radical damage by acting as an antioxidant in the lungs. Smokers need additional C, in higher dosage than nonsmokers. Vitamin therapy doesn’t reduce craving but it can help beat some of the damage created by smoking. Vitamin B 12 and folic acid may help protect against smoking- induced cancer.

Allopathic Treatment

Smokers who want to quit need lots of support and encouragement to help handle the inevitable urges to light up. It helps to quit with a friend or to join a group or behavioral counseling. These groups provide support and teach behavior modification methods that can help the smoker quit. The smoker’s physician can often refer him to such groups.


Other alternatives to help with the withdrawal symptoms of kicking the habit include nicotine replacement therapy in the form of gum, patches, nasal sprays, and oral inhalers. This tapering helps wean the smoker from nicotine slowly, eventually beating his addiction to the drug. But when the smoker lights up while taking a nicotine replacement, a nicotine overdose may cause serious health problems.

Prevention Enforcement and Low



5.1. Introduction

In Malaysia enforcement and low on cigarette are below Ministry of Health Malaysia. Like those we already know cigarettes are below The Food Act 1983, Control of Tobacco Product Regulations 2008, (amendment) 2008 [P.U.(A)315/2008]. http://www.moh.gov.my/ Started from January year 2009, cigarette sold in Malaysia compulsory placed warning pictures said Health Minister, Datuk Liow Tiong Lai. In fact every cigarette pack also need placed the information cigarette content, sale ban to underage buyer, supplier name and address or importer, date produced and number of cigarettes in every box.


5.2. Enforcement and Low in Malaysia

Refer to The Food Act 1983, Control of Tobacco Product Regulations 2008, (amendment) 2008 [P.U.(A)315/2008] are included in part IV regulation 11 and 12 namely prohibition of smoking. The things that contained in that Food Act 1983 were as follows:
Prohibition On Smoking
11. Places where smoking is prohibited
12. Duty of proprietor, etc., of the premises or vehicle


Part IV
Prohibition On Smoking
11. Places where smoking is prohibited
(1) No person shall smoke

(a) in any entertainment centre or theatre, except any pub, discotheque, night club
or casino, at any time when such place is open to the public;
(b) in any hospital or clinic;
(c) in any public lift or toilet;
(d) in any air-conditioned eating place or shop;
(e) in any public vehicle or public transport terminal;
(f) in any building specified by the Minister by notification in the Gazette under regulation 22;
(g) in any airport;
(h) in any government premise;
(i) in any area which is used for any assembly activity in a building other than private or residential building;
(j) in any area in an educational institution or a higher educational institution;
(k) in any area in a nursery;
(l) in any school bus;
(m) in any floor with a service counter in the building specified in the Second Schedule;
(n) in any area in a shopping complex;
(o) in any area in a petrol station;
(p) in any area in a stadium, sports complex, fitness centre or gymnasium;
(q) in any building or public place which is used for religious purposes;
(r) in any area in a library; or
(s) in any area in an internet café.

(2) Notwithstanding subregulation (1), the Minister may, upon application, approve
any area either permanently or for such period as he may determine as smoking
area.
(3) Any person who contravenes subregulation (1) commits an offence and shall on
conviction be liable to a fine not exceeding ten thousand ringgit or to
imprisonment for a term not exceeding two years.

12. Duty of proprietor, etc., of the premises or vehicle

(1) The proprietor or occupier of a premise or the proprietor of a vehicle referred to
in regulation 11 shall at all times:

(a) display a sign as specified in the Third Schedule with regards to the prohibition of smoking at any conspicuous part of the premise or vehicle; and

(b) ensure that no person smokes in the premise or vehicle.

(2) Any person who contravenes paragraph (1)(a) commits an offence and shall on
conviction be liable to a fine not exceeding three thousand ringgit or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding six months.

(3) Any person who contravenes paragraph (1)(b) commits an offence and shall on
conviction be liable to a fine not exceeding five thousand ringgit or to imprisonment
for a term not exceeding one year.

(4) Where an offence under paragraph (1)(b) is committed by the proprietor or the
occupier of the premise, or the proprietor of the vehicle, it shall be a defence for
the person charged to prove that he had taken all reasonable steps to ensure
that no person smokes in the premise or vehicle.

Reference: The Food Act 1983 Control of Tobacco Product Regulations 2008, (amendment) 2008 [P.U.(A)315/2008].

Besides that, Jabatan Perkhidmatan Awam Malaysia (JPA) had already issued press release on ban smoking in dated government premises 5 June 2009 by Unit Komunikasi Korporat (JPA). In that press release ban smoking are referring to The Food Act 1983, Control of Tobacco Product Regulations 2008, (amendment) 2008 [P.U.(A)315/2008]. Where aimed reduce habit smoking among civil servants. Anyone was found guilty because violate this rule actionable law such as fined up RM10,000 or jailed until two years.