Teen Smoking Rate Increased in Alberta

More young Albertans are taking up the smoking habit, Alberta Health said in its annual report released Thursday, particularly those aged 20 to 24. While the smoking rate for that age group declined between 2003 and 2009, it started to trend upward in 2010. In 2009, 25 per cent of people in the age group reported smoking. By 2010, that number had grown to 30 per cent, officials reported in the 2011-2012 summary. Those statistics, originally reported as part of Statistics Canada’s community health survey, also showed an increase in the number of teens smoking, going from 12 per cent in 2009 to 13 per cent in 2010. “It is a very big concern for me that youth smoking rates are going up,” Health Minister Fred Horne said Thursday. “The overall rate is going down, but the bottom line is we still have about 20 per cent of Albertans who are smoking. We have a new tobacco reduction strategy coming soon and it is going to focus to a considerable extent on youth.” Horne said he hopes to release the new strategy soon, noting that issues such as flavoured tobacco and cigarillos that appear to be targeting youth are some of the concerns health officials have raised. Education will be a big part of the strategy, he said. “I think this issue is on the public radar, so we want to get it out just as soon as we possibly can,” he said of the strategy. “Youth smoking, particularly among girls, is high on my mind.” Les Hagen, executive director of Action on Smoking and Health, said Thursday he finds it alarming that the province has failed to meet its targets when it comes to youth smoking prevention for the last five years. He said the absence of a sustained marketing effort to discourage tobacco use among young people has been part of the problem. “We also have a huge issue with tobacco affordability in our province,” Hagen said. “We have among the highest youth wages, so that counteracts tobacco taxes. Because we have high youth wages we need significantly higher tobacco taxes to discourage youth smoking.” Alberta Health reported on a wide range of issues and statistics in its annual report. One area of improvement it noted was a continued drop in Alberta’s rate of newly reported syphilis infections. Alberta had the highest rate of sexually transmitted infections in Canada just a few years ago. Syphilis, a treatable infection that can cause irreversible organ damage or death if left untreated, was a particular concern.