Tobacco promotions in ads, films snare youth

CHICAGO (Reuters Life!) - Hundreds of thousands of U.S. youngsters under the age of 18 start using tobacco each year as a direct result of it being featured in films, videos, advertising and give-away samples, a report said on Monday.

Such exposure more than doubles the odds that any given youth will become a tobacco user, said the report from the University of Massachusetts Medical School and Fitchburg State College in Massachusetts.

"A ban on all tobacco promotions is warranted to protect children," concluded the study published in the Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine.

It was based on an analysis of 51 studies conducted since 1981 covering 141,949 people. It examined exposure to tobacco advertising, promotions and cigarette samples, as well as pro-tobacco depictions in films, television and videos.

"Approximately 1.4 million children under age 18 in the U.S. begin smoking cigarettes each year, and half of these do so as a direct result of their exposure to tobacco advertising," said Dr. Robert Wellman, a co-author of the study.

Wellman said advertising today "fills the pages of magazines whose youth readership exceeds 20 percent, and tobacco use in movies is as pervasive as it was in the 1950s."