Campaign targets Aboriginal smokers

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Black toxic smoke steams up from a cereal bowl overfilled with dirty cigarette butts. The message states: "Toxic stew. With a recipe that includes more than 50 cancer-causing toxic chemicals in each puff . . . Why would you put it in your mouth?"

The brochure this message appears on is one of the elements of an anti-smoking campaign targeting Aboriginal audiences through TV, radio, posters and print advertisements.

In April 2001, the government announced the federal tobacco control strategy. This strategy provides for $560 million over a five-year period. Of that money $530 million funds Health Canada activities, said Emmanuel Chabot, media relations officer with the federal department.

Health Canada decided to include Aboriginal people through the First Nations and Inuit Tobacco Control Strategy, said Chabot.

"So the First Nations and Inuit Tobacco Control Strategy is receiving $50 million over five years . . . and ongoing funding after that," he said.

The ads in the campaign point out that almost 70 per cent of Aboriginal people in Canada smoke cigarettes-twice the smoking rate of non-Aboriginal populations. The messages focus on the hazards of smoking for the smoker, but also on the danger second-hand smoke poses for those around them, including children, Elders, unborn babies, and even strangers sitting at the next table in a restaurant.

The anti-smoking commercials run on the Aboriginal Peoples Television Network (APTN), CBC North and 30 community-based TV stations. As well, a network of Aboriginal radio stations and community-based radio stations are receiving the announcements that are run in English, French and Inuktitut, said Chabot.

"Our marketing research has shown that English, French and Inuktitut are the preferred language of communications for Aboriginal audiences, but as a service to their audiences some Aboriginal media outlets (mostly television and radio stations) will translate our messages into other Aboriginal languages," he said.

"The 1997 First Nations and Inuit Regional Health Survey (FNIRHS) reported smoking rates at 62 per cent . . . most recent surveys suggest that rates have not changed to a great degree," Chabot explained.

These cigarette-smoking rates have remained unchanged from the Statistics Canada estimate of 1991."

Such a result could suggest a strong cultural identification with tobacco, a reluctance to view it as harmful to health and an association to social and economic health determinants," wrote Dr. Jeff Reading in the chapter of the health survey that deals with tobacco. Reading, now the scientific director of the Institute of Aboriginal Peoples' Health, worked as a research consultant for the FNIRHS.

Placing tobacco within the context of Aboriginal traditional uses may be a powerful means of reducing its current misuse, as well as preventing smoking among Aboriginal youth, Reading suggested in the report.

"For many Aboriginal communities, being 'culturally sensitive' also includes respecting tobacco's sacred role and clearly distinguishing between smoking and ceremonial tobacco use," he said.

For more information about the anti-smoking advertising campaign, or for tips to help you stop smoking, call 1-800-O-CANADA (1-800-622-6232) or go on-line at www.gosmokefree.ca.

Coalition promotes non-smoking

Inna Dansereau, Sage Writer, Prince Albert

Tobacco overuse and abuse is very dangerous in many ways, said Stuart North, co-ordinator for the Coalition of People for Smoke Free Places in Prince Albert.

"In First Nation's culture, it's considered the sacred plant and is respected, but at the same time many people abuse it. So it's become very harmful. Some of the Elders will tell people that if you use tobacco for sacred ceremonies that's fine, but if you abuse then it can be very harmful to you," he said.

"We try and make a very strong point about difference between traditional use for religious ceremonies and cultural practices, like presenting tobacco to anElder out of respect before you talk to that Elder or after advice-that's one use of tobacco. And becoming addicted to tobacco and nicotine in tobacco is an abuse of tobacco-and we make that distinction," he said.

For this year's National Non-Smoking Week, Jan. 19 to 25, the coalition planned several activities designed to raise awareness of the dangers of tobacco abuse.

North and Janet Ward, health promotions consultant for the Prince Albert Grand Council, planned to go out to Red Earth reserve on Jan. 13, to do presentations at the J. W. Head high school and Kiway Tinok elementary school.

"We are going to present to individual classrooms. So we'll be presenting to all the classes from Grade 5 right up to Grade 12," North said.

For the higher grades, they would also explain about the advertising done by the tobacco industry.

"We start off talking about traditional use of tobacco before it was commercialized, and then how it became commercialized, and now how the tobacco industry is basically finding ways to make it more addictive and add chemicals to it," said North.

"So we get into the chemicals that you find in tobacco . . . a lot of them are cancer forming, the addictive qualities of nicotine. And then we get into the health effects, how it affects many different organs in the body from your brain with the nicotine, to your lungs with cancer and stomach cancer too, how it affects the skin . . . .

"We also talk about smoker's tobacco, chewing tobacco. Some people think that that's less harmful than smoking tobacco, but in actual fact, it's just as dangerous," he said.

"Smoking cigars will fall into the same category as smoking cigarettes, probably more harmful as they are not filtered and they are very strong. People don't generally inhale cigar smoke unless they're the mild ones but the chemicals in the tobacco get into the saliva and then that goes into the mouth tissue . . . you get it in your system."

North said he and Ward planned to have a disussion with the children about what their situation is at home with second-hand smoke. The children are not aware of the harmful effect it has on them, he said, which can include causing respiratory problems, earaches, tonsillitis, bronchitis, and also giving them an increased chance that they will start to smoke themselves when they get older.

Also as part of Non-Smoking Week, the Prince Albert Youth Activity Centre was planning to have a group of break-dancers come in on Jan. 21 to perform and talk about leading a smoke-free lifestyle.

On Jan. 22-Weedless Wednesday-a display was to be set up at the Gateway Mall, where prizes would be presented to the local winners of the National Non-Smoking Week poster competition for students in grades 5 and 6.