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Chinese Women at Risk From Tobacco Advertising

Published: 2010-08-03    Views:115 reads

 

As a family, US Ambassador to China Jon Huntsman and I are painfully familiar with the losses that tobacco use can bring.

When my sister, Susan, started smoking at age 24, she did not realize that, as a female smoker, her risk of developing an aggressive type of lung cancer was higher than that of a man smoking the same number of cigarettes each day.

After having smoked for 10 years, she was diagnosed with acute lung cancer and succumbed to the disease in just three weeks.

She was only 34 years old and should have been at the height of her life, chasing after her two beautiful young daughters. Instead, she left them motherless.

Susan's early death was preventable, and she could have lived a full life, had she not been addicted to cigarettes.

Chinese women and their families are poised to benefit from China's rise in the global economy. Today, many more Chinese women receive a strong education, work in positions of leadership, and contribute to a higher quality of life for themselves and their families.

But at the same time, Chinese women are being exposed to new risks. China now has more than 300 million smokers, a quarter of the population.

Though in China over 66 percent of men and less than 10 percent of women smoke, tobacco companies see the low number of female smokers as room for growth.

These companies continue to spend millions of yuan on tobacco advertising to convince women and young girls that smoking is a sign of liberation and a way to keep slim. Similar campaigns were run in the US in the 1960s.

We now know, though, that, instead of making them glamorous, smoking makes women sick. Women who smoke are at greater risk of developing potentially fatal diseases such as chronic bronchitis and emphysema.

Smoking also increases women's risks for cardiovascular diseases and many cancers, including heart disease, stroke, leukemia, and cancers of the mouth, esophagus, larynx, pancreas, cervix, breast and lung.

A lesser known effect of smoking is that women who smoke are more likely to experience infertility or delayed conception, and once pregnant, smoking increases the risks of premature delivery, stillbirth, and may decrease breast milk.

Even if a woman doesn't smoke, secondhand smoke can still make her sick. Of the 600,000 deaths caused every year by secondhand smoke across the world, 64 percent occur in women. Equally alarming are the harmful effects of secondhand smoke on developing fetuses.

The Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, US Center for Disease Control and Prevention, and the World Health Organization (WHO) all agree that no amount of secondhand smoke is safe.

In China, half of women of reproductive age are regularly exposed to secondhand smoke.

It is too late for my sister to choose not to smoke, but it is not too late for other smokers.

Earlier this year, the China Tobacco Control Office established a quit line for smokers. Within two weeks of launching the line, over 300 people had called to request help.

The Chinese government is also working hard to ban smoking in the Ministry of Health, its administrative offices, and its subsidiary hospitals by the end of 2010.

This ban will protect non-smokers from secondhand smoke and create a supportive environment for people trying to quit.

As WHO Director-General Margaret Chan, herself a Chinese woman, has said, "Protecting and promoting the health of women is crucial to health and development, not only for the citizens of today, but also for those of future generations."

Smoking and breathing secondhand smoke are threats to the health and well-being of Chinese women and their families.

My hope is that my family's experience will inspire smokers in China to consider quitting.

China should be commended for and should continue its steps to prevent premature loss and needless suffering from tobacco use and help women and children live to their full potential during this exciting time of change and growth in China.