About 45,000 Australian teenagers will start smoking in 2007 and about half of them will ultimately be killed by smoking-related diseases, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Health and Ageing, Christopher Pyne, has warned.
Mr Pyne was launching the Australian Government?s new $25 million National Tobacco Youth Campaign.
?Tobacco smoking is the single largest preventable cause of disease and premature death in Australia, and kills more than 19,000 Australians each year,? he said.
“As about half the people who start smoking during adolescence will ultimately die of a smoking-related disease if they continue to smoke, it is critically important to convince young people not to take up smoking ? or to quit if they are already smoking.”
“The most recent national figures from the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare show that the rate for Australians aged over 14 years who smoke daily has fallen from 19.5 per cent in 2001 to 17.4 per cent in 2004. This is among the lowest of any country in the world.”