Smoke-Free Situation Speech

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Good evening, I am Tsering Lama the Director of New York City Smoke-Free at Public Health Solutions. I am grateful that the Health, Education, Labor, and Pension committee is acknowledging our concern at this hearing. Our non-profit organization oversees programs in New York City that encourage communities to adopt a tobacco-free environment. NYC Smoke-Free at Public Health Solutions has provided higher standard engagement and educational resources among NYC communities for the past 20 years. Our student engagement is a major program, supervised by professionals and managed by student leaders who take part in activities and events to promote a tobacco-free community. This is a statewide program where students from age 13 to 18 can take a lead role in reducing teen smoking by understanding how the tobacco industry targets teenagers. Additionally, we launched the great Smoke-Free Housing campaign in 2009 with the tenants, property managers, buildings, and landlords. Our goal to protect …show more content…

An article called, A Teen Perspective On Smoking In New York City: Wins and Losses are about how a teenager’s perspective on smoking in NYC among youth is actually aggravating. Although vapor is acknowledged as a better alternative than smoking, it also causes harm to our health. The teen mentions how her friends were pushing her to smoke, "'It’s only vapor, it isn’t bad for you,' was a line repeated to me many times by friends trying to urge me to partake. This view of vaping made it significantly more popular than cigarettes among my peers." (Building Health Systems Globally). Likewise, people have limited education on whether alternative forms of cigarette are harmful to our health. The national survey assessed that more than 24% of people age 18-24 think that hookahs are less harmful than smoking cigarettes. (Office of Adolescent