Impact on "TEENS BRAINS"

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/03/110302152820.htm

Studies have linked cigarette smoking to deficits in attention and memory in adults, the greater the teens addiction is to tobacco products, the less active the prefrontal cortex was, suggesting that smoking can affect brain function, the prefrontal cortex is the area where the brain executes decision making functions.

6MILLION annually

http://health.usnews.com/health-news/family-health/heart/articles/2009/08/25/tobacco-use-kills-6-million-people-annually-report

All over the world, 6 million people die from the use of tobacco products, every year, at the same it drains $500 billion from the global economy in the lost of productivity, misused resources, and premature deaths, by year 2015 an estimation of 2.1 million cancer deaths are caused by tobacco products, and by 2030 most of these deaths will take place in developing countries, tobacco is also replacing some potential food productions.

Better use of Tobacco

I think tobacco usage should only be for smoking, or in any way to harm humans and their environment

POLICY

Over the past few years, tougher anti tobacco policies have been established, policies such as plain packing or showing the consequences of using these products, smoking in public places, such as restaurants, cinemas, school etc,taxes on tobacco products have been raised as well, cause it's getting so expensive every where, some smokers are quitting, but some still smoke.
Though in  New Zealand policies for tobacco products can only go so far, cause the government isn't trying to ban tobacco products, but to encourage people not to use them,

Disease

Tobacco is one of the leading causes , and till a few decades ago, medical health reports have been showing, that smoking it, is bad, many people have died from smoking tobacco, over the past few centuries an amount of 100million died from illness caused by smoking tobacco, but in just this century alone, ONE billion people are going to die from it, an average of 6 million people die annually, an estimation of 2.1 million people will die from cancer, that is caused by the use of tobacco products, most of them which will occur in developing countries.

Though everyone knows that smoking is critical to your health, yet teenagers still use tobacco products,not only is it critical to their health, but also their brains, a teen's addiction to nicotine, causes the prefrontal cortex to be less active, which means it's effects their thinking, for example telling what's right and what's wrong.

Use of tobacco products causes diseases, such as lung, heart, cancer, blindness, diabetes, impotence , gum diseases, also increases the brain bleeding risk, at the same time, it affects how long you will live, people who smoke are twice as much exposed to these diseases.
If you're a smoker, who hopes to not go through the rest of your life with these consequences, quit now.

TAXES are NOT effective

http://www.taxationinfonews.com/2012/09/tobacco-taxes-are-not-effective/

Increase of BRAIN BLEED risk

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ukpress/article/ALeqM5h0_oVxDU29oJ4bLISUgcWEYXlrUA?docId=N0255691346246422388A

Smoking tobacco increases the brain bleed risk, even though quitting reduces the danger, but people with heavy smoking history, still have twice as much at risk as people who have never smoked, this report shows an investigation done by Korean researchers, they investigated 426 cases of subarachnoid haemorrhage(SAH) between the year 2002-2004, they were compared with a group 426 people matched for age and sex who had not had a brain bleed, in this study participants who have smoked are are more likely to suffer an SAH than non-smokers.

1,000,000,000 will die

http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1711154,00.html

1 Billion people will die by tobacco related causes by the end of this century, an average of 5.4 million people every year, that's one person every second, these people suffer from almost the same symptoms, and all of these symptoms are linked to tobacco,
This was a report to warn people the dangers of tobacco, countries should start putting effect into anti-tobacco policies, or even more aggressive campaigns, like raising the tax of tobacco, this is actually the most effective tactic,
Tobacco industries are now tapping into the market of women, through out Europe the amount of women smoking and the amount of men smoking are starting to even out, also among the adolescents in Europe girls are more likely to smoke than boys.
Another study says the public are lack education, that not everyone is fully aware of the dangers that tobacco can cause, also a recent Chinese study says only 25% of the their population knows about the health issues of tobacco,

That's a lot of people that will die by the cause of tobacco, some of these are second hand smokers, I have a lot of people around me that died of tobacco, the symptoms that they have are alike, mostly to do with lung, I don't think they were well educated, the problems that tobacco can cause,

Repair the lung and kick the habit

http://www.naturalnews.com/035119_tobacco_lung_health_addiction.html

Native American Indians used tobacco to repair their lung problems,but the tobacco they used was called Lobelia, the use of this tobacco is for lung disorders, such as asthma and bronchia, the difference between tobacco then and now, is that there isn't 600 chemical additives in it, that's added to create virtual freebasing of nicotine, ensuring that the smokers would be addicted for life, there are still people who smoke this pure tobacco, tribes in Amazon and New Guinea are using it, appreciating it for it's healing effects.

I didn't know this until after reading this article, the original tobacco was used for healing, not killing people, ruining their lives making suffer from diseases that might not even have a cure, but only doing chemotherapy and lots more, I've seen people around me going through these therapies, they have to do this every week, if worse every day.

Bad for "Health" good for "Crops"

http://www.naturalnews.com/030226_tobacco_pesticides.html

Tobacco is no longer only used for harming humans, but benefiting the crops, with the decline of demand for tobacco, tobacco farmers are wasting loads and loads of it every year, scientists have found an alternative usage for it, that could spark new life into the tobacco industry, tobacco has long been used as a natural, organic pesticide, and it could be the answer to the widespread use of outmoded, chemical pesticides that are destroying both health and the planet.
Scientists turned the tobacco leaves into bio-oil,  and tested on 11 different fungi species, 4 bacteria, and Colorado potato beetle, not only did it work on the beetle, it also work on some if the fungi and bacteria.

I think this is good news for every one, except the cigarette industry,  the use of tobacco is going to change, for the good of man kind and Earth, using bio-oil extracted from the leaves of tobacco, is a brilliant idea, no more chemical pesticides, only natural ones.

Urgent tobacco policy needed

http://edition.cnn.com/2012/08/16/health/world-smoking-study/index.html?iref=allsearch

Smoking tobacco is spreading all over the world, and fast over the past few years, the tobacco industry is extending there market, into countries with poorer or weaker governments, that have a hard time implementing the steps it take to stop smoking from spreading, they're also targeting youth of both genders and wome.
Countries with powerful governments have declined their rates of smoking, during August Australia had a new rule for tobacco packaging, the packaging must be in plain packaging, there are also other successful stories over the world, one of them is New Zealand.

Landmark report 50 years ago

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-17264442

50 years ago a key report was published, it linked the public's relationship with smoking tobacco, how people back then thought that, smoking isn't the cause of people dying, case one's life is in god's hand, back then reporters and authors needed to get have new ideas to spread word across the public, and the politicians, but it was hard because pretty much everyone smoked.

Now days people know what smoking does to their body, and how it's not in gods hands, but in their hands, less percentage of men and women smoke these days, compared to 50 years ago, also people aren't aloud to smoke inside, they can only smoke in open public areas.

10 Links

1.http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10821442

2.http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-17264442

3.http://edition.cnn.com/2012/08/16/health/world-smoking-study/index.html?iref=allsearch

4.http://www.naturalnews.com/030226_tobacco_pesticides.html

5.http://www.naturalnews.com/035119_tobacco_lung_health_addiction.html

6.http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1711154,00.html

7.http://www.google.com/hostednews/ukpress/article/ALeqM5h0_oVxDU29oJ4bLISUgcWEYXlrUA?docId=N0255691346246422388A

8.http://www.taxationinfonews.com/2012/09/tobacco-taxes-are-not-effective/

9.http://health.usnews.com/health-news/family-health/heart/articles/2009/08/25/tobacco-use-kills-6-million-people-annually-report

10.http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/03/110302152820.htm

Introduction

The origin of tobacco was first discovered by native American Indians, then in 1492 Christopher Columbus visited a tribe, they offered if to him as a gift, soon after he returned to Europe, the plant was being grown all over Europe, people in Europe believed that, tobacco has healing properties.
During the 1600's tobacco was "as good as gold", in the 1760 the first cigars was invented, years after scientists begin to discover the chemicals in tobacco, and how it damages the human body.
Later on in the later 1800's people started chewing tobacco, it was actually very popular during the time, it wasn't until the 1900's that cigarette became popular to men.Then in the 50's more and more evidence of smoking effecting health,but the tobacco industry denied these hazards, a decade later ads of smoking were taking off Great Britain t.v.

The above is just a short summary of tobacco, how it came to be, in my link there are more details of the how tobacco took part in history.

1.PM:Tougher tobacco laws "unlikely"

This NZ herald article, is talking about, how Prime Minister John Key, thinks about making the laws for tougher,  the Prime Minister said that if we banned cigarettes in New Zealand, it would also be effectively saying that we're banning the substance, which is extremely difficult, but what his Government can do is, telling the public, "hey smoking is bad and we prefer you don't smoke and we will give you every encouragement not to do so," there are also some laws introduced in this article, what the changes would be.
In the last few paragraphs it talks about how tobacco companies are fighting back these laws, they've also set up a website "agree disagree" for the public to know their oppositions and restrictions.

 I think we need tougher laws for tobacco , but I also agree with what the PM says that people have their own choices, the law can only do so much, but unless we ban tobacco form New Zealand, people will keep buying, what we need is to encourage people not to smoke, for example quit lines , helping people get off their smoking habits, not letting smoking take control of you life, but letting yourself be in control, also letting people who smoke know how much they'd save,  most importantly they need support from family and friends.