The 13th World Conference on Tobacco OR Health

Objective: In the UK, 450 children start smoking each day. Smoking cannot be considered an isolated activity and while in the UK there are many stop smoking services designed for adults, there is very little provision for children and young people.

Methods: QUIT developed the Break Free programme, a comprehensive stop smoking service which helps children and young people make informed choices about tobacco use and provides practical, tailored support and advice to those wanting to stop smoking. Break Free works within formal and informal education settings with children as young as 8 years old. Young people's smoking behaviour cannot be addressed in isolation and Break Free therefore also incorporates help and support for parents, teachers and other adults who wish to stop smoking. Ensuring youth orientated practical solutions to national stop smoking priorities. Break Free works in partnership with a broad range of multi-sectoral and multi-professional agencies including British Heart Foundation, Cancer Research UK to develop new programmes in the field of youth smoking intervention and prevention.

Results: Rather than "reinventing the wheel", Break Free facilitates links between these adults and locally available, established smoking cessation clinics and groups. Thus this programme sets out to do what has so often been recommended, but rarely done, namely to approach young people's smoking as a network of personal, family, school and community influences. Break Free has worked with 800,000 children and young people to date within their communities and provides ongoing telephone counselling support to over 30,000 children each year.