Great American Smokeout Set for November 19 as the American Cancer Society Urges Smokers to Make a Quit Plan
The American Cancer Society's Great American Smokeout falls this year on Thursday, November 19, the third Thursday of November. The society has hosted the event for almost 50 years, and its purpose is not to demand that smokers quit in a single day, but to encourage them to use the date to make a plan to quit, or to plan in advance and start a cessation plan on the day itself.
The society's figures show why quitting matters: smoking and exposure to secondhand smoke cause more than 480,000 deaths in the United States every year, smoking increases the risk of at least 12 different cancers, and in the U.S. about 3 of every 10 cancer deaths are caused by cigarette smoking, a share that is higher in parts of the South and Appalachia. The society also notes that no matter a person's age or how long they have smoked, quitting improves some aspects of health immediately and even more over the long term.
The event grew from a 1970 gathering in Randolph, Massachusetts, where Arthur P. Mullaney asked people to give up cigarettes for a day and donate the money they would have spent to a high school scholarship fund. On November 18, 1976, the California Division of the American Cancer Society got nearly 1 million people who smoke to quit for the day, marking the first official Smokeout, and the society took it nationwide in 1977. Community programs and smoke-free laws followed in the years since.
Quitting is difficult, the society says, but a good plan and support raise the odds: getting help through counseling and medications doubles or even triples a person's chances of quitting successfully. Help is available at cancer.org/smokeout and by calling 1-800-227-2345, where the society provides support 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, from questions about quitting to finding national and local resources. (Source: American Cancer Society)
Source: American Cancer Society
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图：烟灰缸里的一支香烟（Kiwiev 摄，Wikimedia Commons，CC0公共领域）。 / Photo: A cigarette resting in an ashtray, by Kiwiev, Wikimedia Commons (CC0 public domain).
