Disciplinary attitudes and cigarette smoking: a comparison of two schools SIR,-I agree with Dr Alan Porter's suggestion (1 1 December, p 1725) that measures that reduce the exposure of an uncommitted adolescent to peer group smoking may decrease the chances of tobacco dependence in childhood. The recognition of the immediate rather than long term harmful effects of smoking is an important consideration in persuading patients not to smoke, and parental attitudes and smoking behaviour influence a child's propensity to smoke.' Most smokers begin smoking before the age of 20, and those who have not smoked before this age are unlikely to begin.2 3 Our unpublished data on the effects of smoking on cardiorespiratory disorders suggest that smoking does much more harm to younger patients than to middle aged patients and that-over the age of 60 there is no difference between smokers and non-smokers. This suggests that a preventive approach must be directed at those in the first two decades of life and "no smoking" should become a family affair in view of the fact that young people are much less likely to smoke when neither parent does.
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