Vol. 242 No. 1
asked the Minister for Health if, having regard to the disclosure in a report in The Economic and Social Review that three-quarters of the boys and one-fifth of the girls in Dublin schools have smoked by the age of 16 years, he will intensify the campaign to discourage young people from smoking and if he will make a statement on the matter.
12.
asked the Minister for Health if he has studied the results of a survey, published in The Economic and Social Review, into the incidence of smoking among Dublin school-children; what steps are being taken to discourage cigarette smoking among schoolchildren; and, if no steps are being taken, what action he proposes to take to correct this situation.
With your permission, a Cheann Comhairle, I will take Questions Nos. 11 and 12 together.
I think the first thing I should make clear in answering these questions is that the article to which the Deputies have referred was based on the report of a survey which was published in the Irish Journal of Medical Science in March, 1968. My Department were aware of that report and have had regard to it in their efforts to educate the public, particularly the younger generation, as to the hazards to health inherent in smoking cigarettes.
For the record I should point out that the report showed that, while 68 per cent of the boys included in the survey had tried smoking by 16 years of age, 61 per cent of these had, in fact, discontinued the habit. Where girls are concerned, 46 per cent had tried smoking by 16 years of age but 79 per cent of these had given it up.
The report is a most useful and most interesting one and while it does point to the need for a certain concern it does not, I think, in its totality call for any particular intensification of the anti-cigarette smoking campaign.
Will the Minister state what is the extent of the anti-smoking campaign to which he now refers?
As the Deputy knows there is publicity in all the schools in regard to the dangers of smoking and RTE are to phase out cigarette advertisements by 1971. Those are largely the measures that have been taken.
Would the Minister consider having an anti-smoking campaign on RTE as being the most popular medium of communication?
I would if I thought it would have much effect. I think it is much better to approach people at a young age in regard to this matter. So far as cigarettes are concerned, the smoking of cigarettes is entirely a voluntary matter. As the Deputy knows, those who smoke very moderately are not so subject to the danger of lung cancer as those who smoke heavily. The campaign would have to be considered in that light.
I think the Minister is trying to evade the issue.
Question No. 13.
