why are young people addicted to tobacco?

Toast one for a break to do as your friends do, to beat boredom or manage your stress. Tobacco still attracts nearly 200,000 young people to France every year, some of whom started very early. “I started when I was 15”, says a passerby at the microphone of France Télévisions, while another confides that she started at the age of 11. However, the earlier smoking begins, the more it increases the risk of addiction.

“Between 13 and 20, the brain is like a sponge. It learns to make new connections, it includes new receptors, especially nicotinic receptors, much more efficiently at that age”Explain Professor Bertrand Dautzenberg, pulmonologist. Among 15-24 year olds, the French are the second biggest smokers in Europe: they are 36.4%, behind young Bulgarians (38.7%) and just ahead of Croats (36%). On the other hand, they claim to know the health risks, but for them, this threat is still far away. According to Professor Loïc Josseran, President of the Alliance Against Tobacco, teenage smoking is explained by the fact that “two-thirds of tobacconists in France sell tobacco to minors without verifying their identity, their age, which is contrary to the public health code.”