Up until the 1950s, smoking was a socially acceptable practice that the majority of the population did.
Up until the 1950s, smoking was a socially acceptable practice that the majority of the population did. The tobacco industry used advertising in many places such as movies, magazines, books, television, radio and billboards to make cigarettes seem appealing that everybody had to go try it. Up to $20 million packages of cigarettes were sold each day in Canada alone. People were unaware about the health risks that went along with smoking and the tobacco industry didn’t tell the public about all the chemicals that they put into their cigarettes. Nobody ever thought that the popularity of smoking would decrease later on.
Since then, the smoking rate has shrunk to nearly half its size because of increased awareness. They found out about all the harmful chemicals that the tobacco industry was putting into cigarettes, the number of people that died each year because of smoking, the health risks from smoking and the even greater risks from second-hand smoke. From that point, the public began to protest and/or sue the tobacco industries for not telling the public what was actually inside the cigarettes, false advertising and ruining people’s health. It took the public 50 years to bring down the tobacco industry but it was worth it. Now, every single cigarette carton sold to consumers must have warning labels on them that inform them about risks from smoking. The tobacco industry can’t advertise their products almost anywhere anymore Canada anymore and cities such as Ottawa has done the unthinkable by prohibiting people from smoking inside public buildings.
