Movie makers take cigarettes out of scenes

by Aimee Keenan-Greene

People are seeing less smoking on the silver screen.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention say the number of on-screen tobacco incidents in youth-rated, G, PG, or PG-13 movies, continues a downward trend; decreasing 71.6 percent from 2,093 incidents in 2005,  to 595 last year. 

The three companies with published policies designed to reduce tobacco use in their movies had an average decrease in tobacco incidents of 95.8 percent, compared with an average decrease of 41.7 percent among the three major motion picture companies and independents without policies.

Health officials say this shows an enforceable policy aimed at reducing tobacco use in youth-rated movies can lead to substantially fewer tobacco incidents in movies and help prevent adolescent initiation of smoking.

The National Cancer Institute says there is a causal relationship between exposure to depictions of smoking in movies and youth smoking initiation.  Adolescents in the top quarter of exposures to onscreen tobacco incidents have been found to be approximately twice as likely to begin smoking as those in the bottom quarter.

The World Health Organization and numerous public health groups have recommended giving movies with tobacco incidents an R rating, with two exceptions: those movies that portray a historical figure who smoked and those that portray the negative effects of tobacco use.

In related news, a new Gallup poll says 59 percent of Americans support a ban on smoking in all public places for the first time since Gallup asked the question a decade ago. However fewer than 2 in 10 support making smoking illegal.