Tobacco use among youths--Argentina, 2007 and 2012

Tobacco use is the leading preventable cause of deaths worldwide. The MPOWER package, the six recommended policies of the World Health Organization (WHO) to reverse the tobacco epidemic, strongly recommends monitoring tobacco use trends. Because evidence indicates that smoking addiction often starts before the age of 18 years, there is a need to monitor tobacco use among youths. During 2011, a National Tobacco Control Law was enacted in Argentina that included implementation of 100% smoke-free environments, a comprehensive advertising ban (prohibiting advertising, promotion, and sponsorship of cigarettes or tobacco products through any media or communications outlets), pictorial health warnings, and a prohibition against the sale of tobacco products through any means to persons aged <18 years. To ascertain trends in tobacco use among youths in Argentina, the Argentina Ministry of Health and CDC analyzed data from the Global Youth Tobacco Survey (GYTS) for 2007 and 2012 (the next year that it was administered in Argentina). The findings indicated that the overall proportion of youths aged approximately 13-15 years who reported ever smoking a cigarette declined from 52.0% in 2007 to 41.9% in 2012 with significant decreases among both males and females. In 2012, 52.5% of youths in Argentina reported secondhand smoke (SHS) exposure in their homes and 47.5% in enclosed public places in the 7 days preceding the survey. Increased public education and tobacco control efforts will be important to discouraging tobacco use and decreasing SHS exposure among youths in Argentina.