Other health risks include a decrease in physical fitness and retardation in the level of lung function and growth rate of the lungs. While teens underestimate health risks, they also overestimate their abilities to quit the habit of smoking. Teens need to understand that cigarettes lead to an addiction to nicotine. Trying to quit smoking can be just as difficult as ending one s addiction to cocaine or heroin. In fact, statistics show that 40 percent of teenagers who smoke on a regular basis have tried to quit the habit and have been unsuccessful.
Prevention plays an important factor in combating teen smoking.
After all, the younger a person is when he starts smoking, the more likely that he will develop a severe addiction. Teens need to be told the facts about this deadly habit. Tobacco smoke includes at least 60 substances that are known to cause cancer. Each year, cigarette smoking is responsible for at least one-third of all cancer deaths. More than 430,000 people die from smoking-related diseases every year.