First Class Fitness

British Students

British researchers have shown that the most important advice for health, which usually give the parents for their children – namely, not to smoke – the best way to achieve its goal, serve as advisors such as children. More than one-fifth can decrease the number of children addicted to this pernicious habit, when the most influential students on a specially designed program "educate" their peers, telling them about the dangers of smoking. If a similar technique to apply across the country, according to estimates, the number of smokers in adolescents aged 14-15 years may be reduced by 43 thousand people per year. Today each other can have a positive tone, this property should only operate correctly. This is confirmed by research conducted by scientists at Bristol and Cardiff universities. In the experiment, Adolescents who were to become advocates of their own kind. The remaining schools in the control group. During the two-day training session conducted outside the school where the teachers talked about the dangers of smoking and the benefits out of it, as well as the next two and a half months, supporters of the task was to convince his friends to the benefits of quitting, so that they threw it up.

It worked. In schools where the program was implemented with the help of teenagers, at once as its end the number of students wishing to smoke decreased by 25% compared with the schools, which are part of an experiment in the control group. The effect has been confirmed, although it decreased slightly with time. Thus, a year later the number of students, ex-smokers, 23% two years later – 15%. In order to check whether the children were smoking all the time, they had taken samples of saliva, as well as the completed questionnaires. The results were published in British medical journal The Lancet. Judging by the fact that more than 90% of participants in the program (and it is the students and teachers) gave it a positive review, and no school is not eliminated from participation in its implementation can be suggest that this program can thrive. Enrolment in schools was very different, and the program was equally good effect on smokers and those who never smoked.

Authors programs emphasize that the prevention of youth smoking successfully prevents the development of most diseases, one way or another connected with it. However, if a person has smoked, the hardest to give up this occupation is habits. Such an approach will contribute to uniformity with regard to the health of rich and poor citizens. The Independent, translated from English