RESUMO
Although recent trends indicate a rising cigarette-smoking prevalence among adolescents in African countries, data on characteristics and attitudes of these African adolescent smokers are scarce despite the peculiar socio-cultural and economic patterns of African countries compared to Western and Asian countries. This study sought to determine the prevalence of cigarette smoking among public senior secondary (SS) school boys in Oredo Local Government Area (LGA) of Edo State and identify the associated risk factors and behaviors. In this school-based cross-sectional study, anonymous self-administered questionnaire was used in obtaining data on cigarette smoking from 1,060 students in the two males-only secondary schools located in the LGA. The prevalence of cigarette smoking was 12.0%, 22.4% and 17.1% among first-year (SS1), second-year (SS2) and third-year (SS3) students respectively, with an overall prevalence of 16.5%. The mean age at which smoking began was 16.9 + 1.2 years (95% confidence interval, CI = 16.7 – 17.1). A significantly higher risk of smoking was associated with having parents, elder siblings or best friends who smoke. Tolerant attitude of parents and best friends towards smoking by their sons/friends encouraged smoking among students. The two major reasons for taking up smoking were peer pressure effect (36.5%) and the need to mix freely with peers in social situations (22.9%). All the smokers were “light smokers” (smoking less than 10 sticks of cigarette per day). 3.4% of the smokers smoked their first cigarette within 30 minutes after waking up in the morning. Among the smokers, 80.6% admitted smoking was harmful and 60% said they would like to quit smoking but lacked the will power and were uncertain how to quit. Considering that the prevalence of smoking among adolescents tend to increase with age, school-based smoking control intervention programs should start in the primary/junior secondary schools and they must also address family influences on adolescent smoking. Empowering adolescents with skills to resist peer pressure is advocated.