During the Sponge launching-presscon, Provincial Health Officer 1 Dr. Edgardo Barredo warned the public smokers of the ill effects of tobacco to human life.
The Sponge campaign aims to inform cigarette smokers in the province about the serious impact tobacco has on their health, and motivate them to quit before they become sick.
According to Dr. Barredo, this campaign graphically depicts the amount of tar that collects inside an average smoker’s lungs. This brings so many cancer diseases in the body that is fatal, he added.
In his testimony, Mabinay Mayor Jango Uy narrated how he suffered coughs for three months due to acute bronchitis.
Mayor Uy, however, has never been a smoker. He was a victim of secondhand smoking as his father was a chain smoker. His father was the former Chief of Hospital in Mabinay, but he promised to stop smoking shortly after he was diagnosed a smoking-related disease.
The mayor pledged to fully support the program through an anti-smoking ordinance passed by the municipality.
Meanwhile, Pamplona Mayor Apollo Arnaiz testified being a chain smoker for four years, but said he decided to quit for longer life, to keep the family and seven grandchildren healthy, and for his officemates’ well-being. As leader in the town, he has to lead by example.
With the ordinance, nobody will smoke inside the town hall, the mayor said.
Negros Oriental is one of the provinces nationwide being piloted by the Department of Health and the World Lung Foundation as more LGUs have been pushing and passed ordinances for tobacco control in the Philippines. (mbcn/JCT/PIA 7)
