While today marks the 33rd annual Great American Smokeout, put away your firewood because this isn’t a call for a national bonfire, as the name might mistakenly imply, but is instead an event sponsored by the American Cancer Society that encourages smokers to drop the habit for 24 hours. By urging smokers to not puff on a cigarette for a whole day, the ACS hopes that this may be just the right kind of motivation to get them to quit permanently. The yearly event first began in 1977, and the percentage of adult smokers in the U.S. dropped from 34 to 21 percent from 1978 to 2005. That rate, however, has not budged since, and 46.6 million U.S. adults still smoke.
Despite all the strict anti-smoking regulations in place and the availability of certain cessation aids, the rate of smoking has stalled, and the quit rate at one year still hovers in the 10-15 percent range, says ACSH's Dr. Gilbert Ross. “We need better cessation aids such as ‘clean nicotine’ delivery systems found in e-cigarettes and smokeless tobacco products like snus.”
Volunteers at schools, malls and workplaces around the country will be disseminating information about how to quit as well as publicizing other events.
“People have become numb to this. Events like these may have had an impact 20 years ago, but I think now people are immune to the message,” ACSH's Dr. Elizabeth Whelan says about ACS’s renewed efforts. “Hopefully, though, if we continue to publicly highlight the dangers of cigarette smoking, some will heed our advice and stop smoking.”