The University of Memphis student health department will host their annual National Kick Butts Day event March 16.
This event will take place in the University Center from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. J
acqueline De Fouw, registered nurse and U of M health educator, said she wants to grab the attention of all students, both smokers and non-smokers.
“National Kick Butts Day is a day for people to consider smoking cessation,” De Fouw said.
“We want people to think about not smoking, and then we want people who do not smoke but are considering to start smoking to really think about whether or not they really want to smoke,” she said.
Smoking tobacco remains an age-old problem in the United States.
Tobacco smoking kills more than 480,000 Americans each year, with 41,000 of these deaths being a result of secondhand smoke exposure, according to a report by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention.
The CDC also reported the use of tobacco usually begins during the adolescent stage. Nine out of 10 cigarette smokers first experience smoking by age 18, and 99 percent first experience smoking by age 26.
Every day in the United States, more than 3,800 people aged 18 or younger smoke their first cigarette, and 2,100 of them become daily smokers.
De Fouw said it is important high school and college students are presented with facts, so they do not make a decision that is going to be harmful to them later in life.
“Smoking accounts for one out of every five deaths,” De Fouw said.
“There have been several statistics that have been gathered from Harvard and some of the different smoking studies,” she said.
“[The studies] show that smokers have lower grade point averages in school, and smokers often participate in risky behaviors more than the other students, such as trying other illicit drugs and sexual experiences,” she said. “Smokers tend to have more sexual partners than others over a span of time.”
At the National Kick Butts Day event, De Fouw and Delmecia Phillips, sophomore nursing major, said they are going to host a game representing kicking the smoking habit.
“We’re going to play “kick butts,” and then I’ll be at the table giving out information about how you shouldn’t smoke tobacco and cigarettes,” Phillips said.
“We’re going to have a can that looks like an ash tray, and then we’re going to make butts,” she said. “The goal is to kick the butt into the ash tray, and we’ll be giving out prizes.”
De Fouw said the game shows quitting a smoking habit could be very difficult. “Trying to kick the butt into the can is very hard, and there is an analogy there with smoking,” she said. “Most people that quit smoking have to quit like seven or eight times.”
De Fouw has some advice for students who smoke or are considering smoking. “If you want to quit, come and see me, and if you are thinking about smoking, come see me, and I will turn into your mother very quickly,” she said.
