Smoking Policy

Smoking is the act of inhaling and exhaling the fumes of burning plant material. A variety of plant materials are smoked, including marijuana and hashish, but the act is most commonly associated with tobacco as smoked in a cigarette, cigar, or pipe. Tobacco contains nicotine, which is addictive and can have both stimulating and tranquilizing effects. The smoking of tobacco, long practiced by American Indians, was introduced to Europe by Christopher Columbus and other explorers. Smoking soon spread to other areas and today is widely practiced around the world despite medical, social, and religious arguments against it. My focus will be on the Massachusetts Ban on Smoking Chapter 270: Section 22. Smoking in public places. This paper will then link the American Lung Association and their participation in the fight against smoking.

The dawn of the 20th century was the golden age of the cigarette, tobacco products were cigars, pipe tobacco, and chewing tobacco. The mass production of cigarettes was beginning to increase dramatically. The evolution of tobacco smoking from ancient times to the modern industrial age was used worldwide and on a large scale. Tobacco products were suspected of producing some adverse health effects, yet tobacco was also considered to have medicinal properties . Many scholars and health professionals of the day advocated tobacco's use for such effects as improved concentration and performance, relief of boredom, and enhanced mood.

The success of the cigarette was due not only to the business strategies of the large firms but also to the rapid adoption by urban male youths of the relatively inexpensive and easy-to-smoke lighter flue-cured Virginia tobacco. In particular, this product became a favorite of teenage boys that led to public outcries, to the revival of anti-tobacco movements in France, Australia, Britain, Canada, and the United States to the eventual passing, in the 1890s and 1900s, of legislation across most territorial and federal states banning the sale of tobacco to minors. The legislation, however, was largely ineffective, and World War I quickly put an end to the critique of young men's cigarette smoking. In the trenches cigarettes were easier to smoke than pipes, and tobacco companies, the military, governments, and newspapers organized a constant supply of cigarettes to the troops. Certain companies did extraordinarily well from the war: Imperial's Players and Woodbine brands in Britain and, more spectacularly, R.J. Reynolds's Camel in the United States4. Introduced only in 1913, Camel had reached sales of 20 billion cigarettes by 1920, following a government supply order and a successful marketing campaign. The war transformed smoking habits. As early as 1920, more than 50 percent of the tobacco consumed in Britain was in the form of cigarettes. A less-urban U.S. population lagged behind, but a similar story in World War II saw cigarettes achieve more than 50 percent of all tobacco sales in 19411. Several other industrial countries matched this trend.

In 1950 around half of the population of industrialized countries smoked. Smoking was an acceptable form of social behavior in all areas of life. At work, in the home, in bars, and at the cinema and advertisers were eager to show the full range of leisure activities made complete only through the addition of a cigarette. Smoking cigarettes was popular across all social classes and increasingly among women. This development had less to do with the efforts of advertisers, for example, in 1925 introduced the Marlboro brand as a woman's cigarette: "Mild as May" and more to do with the impact of war and a direct confrontation with societal attitudes by "so-called" new women5. Most important, the cigarette habit was legitimated, celebrated, and glamorized on the Hollywood screen and transported to the rest of the world. Movie stars such as Edward G. Robinson, James Cagney, Spencer Tracy, Gary Cooper, and especially Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall, and Marlene Dietrich raised the image of the cigarette to something of an icon, ensuring it would never lose its sophisticated and loftily independent connotations.

The German-born American physician Ernst L. Wynder and by the British statisticians Austin Bradford Hill and Sir Richard Doll provided firm evidence linking lung cancer with smoking. This information came as a considerable shock to smokers, who proved reluctant to give up their habit. Of course, their decisions had already been influenced by physical addiction, advertising, and the denials of the tobacco industry, but, even after the reports by the Royal College of Physicians (1962) and the U.S. surgeon general (1964) clearly stating the poisonous health effects of smoking, quitting rates were not as high as might have been expected. An average of two million persons gave up smoking every year in the United States in the decade after 1964, but about half that number also began smoking every year, and not all quitters were able to remain nonsmokers.

When the 21st century came around tobacco became recognized as being highly addictive and one of the world's most devastating causes of death and disease. The rapid increase in smoking in developing nations in the late 20th century, the number of smoking-related deaths rose rapidly in the 21st century. In the late 1990s there were approximately 4 million tobacco-caused deaths per year worldwide . This estimate was increased to approximately 5 million in 2003 and could reach 10 million per year by the 2020s.

Founded in 1904 by contributions from the public, along with gifts and grants from corporations, foundations and government agencies, to fight tuberculosis, the American Lung Association today fights lung disease in all its forms, with emphasis on asthma, tobacco control and environmental health. The ALA achieves its many successes through the work of thousands of committed volunteers and staff.

The ALA has many tobacco controls, smoking prevention and cessation programs that educated and inform adults and teenagers. In speaking with an employee at the ALA, I had the chance to ask some questions regarding their organization.

What is the mission of the agency?

The mission of the ALA is lung health. The organization

When was the agency started?

The ALA was started back in 1904 more than 100 years ago.

How is the agency funded?

The ALA is funded by contributions from the public, along with gifts and grants from corporations, foundations and government agencies.

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