This last month WHO, the World Health Organization focused more attention on tobacco ads that target women and girls.
Females represent a large market of potential new smokers, especially woman and young females in developing countries.
Take a look at many of the new Big Tobacco’s aggressive campaigns and ads. You will find them linked to fashion, entertainment, and even sports events. Marketing tactics don’t stop at ad campaigns. The latest package designs and the look and feel of many cigarettes are clearly made for “females only.”
“The industry’s market strategy is having its desired impact,” Douglas Bettcher, director of WHO’s tobacco free initiative, said at a news briefing. “More and more girls are starting to light up. This is a serious red flag.”
World No Tobacco Day Released Youth Smoking Survey
In the countries of Chile, Colombia, and Mexico as well as in Eastern Europe teenage girls who smoke is beginning to outnumber teenage male smokers.
Comparing 151 country’s numbers we find girls that are lighting up is now equaling male youth smokers who once dominated younger users.
The low and middle income country’s tobacco campaigns often use very seductive ads that associate tobacco use with beauty and liberation. Pink is becoming a trendy, smoking fashion statement.
Pink Cigarettes & Fashion Pink Packaging
It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to realize five million people die every year from tobacco-related health problems caused from smoking or second-hand smoke exposure. Two of the three who die from second hand smoke related deaths are women.
Japan tobacco campaigns include pink packs of cigarettes and one cigarette maker in Egypt markets a cigarette pack that resembles a perfume container.
“The industry has studied what makes women tick in both the developed and developing countries,” said Adepeju Olukoya, of the WHO’s gender, women and health department.
Enticing Flavored Cigarettes
Appealing to the market of emotional eaters, taste is another niche to hook new smokers.
The Black Devil Brand comes in an assortment of flavors and colors. Even the name implies you can do something “naughty” and get away with it.
The pink cigarettes are flavored with “Rose” which is one of the most appealing of fragrances in the world. The black package contains chocolate flavored death sticks, one of the most sought after tastes and foods.
By piggybacking on “Chocolate and Roses” the cigarettes mask the reality that their ingredients and harmful, toxic and can shorten one’s life. Praying on the emotions of young people to get them to pick up their first cigarette is a pretty disgusting tactic. Especially, since younger people are the least likely to contemplate mortality and the pain associated with prolonged health problems.
Most of us know how easy it is to become hooked on tobacco when the cigarettes are laced with ingredients that also stimulate the addictive centers in the brain.
Next we may see prescription drug manufacturers doing the same thing.
Reference:
(Editing by Michael Taylor) http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSLDE64R1Z420100528?type=marketsNews
If this is so, why don’t those in authority ban it? They can start by banning the advertising, as it was done in Sri Lanka. Those who are responsible for this type of advertising and who make these cigarettes that cause so many deaths should be charged with mass murder. You people think that murder can be done only instantaneously. And even go to the extent of invading some helpless countries charging they have weapons of mass destruction. They have not used such weapons. And at the end you find no such weapon but manage to get away with all that was done in the name of WMD. You just talk about this smoking and keep talking about it but the actions contradict the talking, start acting.
The word “you” used in my comment is not targeted at Sandy in all places. Some are for Americans and some are for Western people in general. Sorry if it hurt your feelings, Sandy. You are a nice person and that is the very reason why you came up with this article. Love to ya, Sandy.
Greetings Sinhelaya … Thank you for your “kick in the pants” comment! Comparing the tobacco industry with legal weapons of mass destruction is not that far fetched. Of course cigarettes and tobacco products don’t blow up buildings etc, but they certainly leave devastating effects on people’s health, along with the heartbreak and challenges families are left to deal with when loved ones get ill. I wish more people where like you Sinhelaya, and stepped up demanding people take action. That is the purpose of CiggyFree.com blog, to help people wake up to the mass hypnosis that this industry is doing a pretty good job at implementing and take steps to heal. Everyone should read this article > How Long After You Quit Smoking Does it Take Your Body to Heal