Manal Shafiq, Zainab Hasan Waqar, Abdullah El-muttaqi.
To assess the cigarette smoking behavior and the effectiveness of cigarette pack warning on general population: a cross-sectional descriptive survey.
Pak J Surg Jan ;30(1):40-4.

Objective: To study the trend of smoking in general population, it’s initiating and quitt ing factors and to determine the role and eff ectiveness of the pictorial warning on cigarett e pack in promoting quitt ing. Material and methods: A cross sectional survey was conducted of 526 smokers. Subjects were personally interviewed in Urdu, by the researchers using a questionnaire derived from WHO, GTSS questionnaire. Results: Out of 526 smokers, 54.2% were att racted to smoking due to peer pressure. But while quitt ing, only 4% of them face peer pressure. “Habituation and craving” (49.4%) were the main hindrances in quitt ing. 47.9% of our subjects noticed an antismoking warning, out of which 60.3% noticed it on a cigarett e pack. Th e cigarett e pack pictorial warning was perceived as mouth cancer by only 8.4% of our subjects, other relate it to cancer (13.4%) and health hazard (16.0%) Conclusion: Smoking has become a social behavior. Friends play a major role in introduction and initiation of smoking but they don’t have a significant role in quitting. Th e subjects were not sensitized to the relation between “mouth cancer” and “smoking”, making the pictorial warning ineffective.

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