Objective: to raise awareness among young people about the importance of primary prevention of lung cancer. To teach children and young people to follow correct lifestyles and to give up smoking, in December 2021 Italian schools were invited to participate in the ‘Breathe together’ competition, creating a project that would remember the importance of correct lifestyles to prevent this neoplasm. To respond to the call-to-action were 18 institutes, including primary and secondary schools of first and second degree. A claim was assigned to each school order: for elementary school the instrument was music, with “Let’s sing deeply”, for middle school the illustration, with “No to smoking, yes to comics”, while high school was are dedicated to art, with “Breathe the art and put it aside”. The award ceremony, which took place today, gave the first classified projects a cash prize that will be used to meet the needs of children and schools. All the works are available on the oncologiatoracica.it website.
“Smoking is one of the most dangerous habits for health – says Filippo de Marinis, AIOT Secretary and President-elect and director of the Thoracic Oncology of the IEO in Milan -. In addition to lung cancer, it can also cause cardiovascular disease: in the world it causes more deaths from alcohol, AIDS, traffic accidents, drugs, homicides and suicides combined. Several studies have shown that the age of the first cigarette is always lower, it starts already in middle school. It is a worrying situation, which must be contained, starting precisely from education in schools. At AIOT we have always been involved in promoting primary prevention: quitting smoking or reducing the number of cigarettes means taking care of yourself and your future “.
“It is appropriate that education and awareness of the damage of smoking pass through schools – underlines Maria Costanza Cipullo, Coordinator for prevention and health education of the Ministry of Education -. It is there that children and young people are most open to listening, so it is possible to give them the tools to understand what can damage their health. As a Ministry, we have launched this call because we are aware of how important it is to start with the smallest to educate the great of today and tomorrow. AIOT has created engaging slogans, capable of thrilling both children and adolescents, with musical activities, comics and artistic creations, to make people think and have fun at the same time. The winning works of the competition met the required requirements, such as congruity in the representation of the theme, the effectiveness of the message of prevention, imagination and creativity. There were two examining commissions, the first with members indicated by AIOT and the second under the responsibility of the Ministry of Education “.
“We started in December because November is the month of lung cancer prevention – concludes Rossella Spinetti, AIOT treasurer -. We are very satisfied with the participation of the institutes: it started as an experimental project, but there have been many adhesions, with enthusiastic young people, despite the burdensome theme. For this reason we have decided to re-propose the project also for the 2022/2023 school year, this time starting in September to facilitate the organization of the programs “.