Page 22 - TAIWAN TOBACCO CONTROL ANNUAL REPORT 2019

20 Smoking cessation education on junior high, senior high, and vocational school campuses The School Health Act requires schools below the level of senior high to enforce campus- wide prohibition of smoking. The Tobacco Hazards Prevention Act also stipulated that persons younger than 18 years of age are not allowed to smoke and prohibits anyone from supplying tobacco products to those under the age of 18 years. In addition, according to the regulations of the "Smoking Cessation Education Implementation Guideline" stipulated in accordance with the authorization under the Tobacco Hazards Prevention Act, schools shall provide smoking cessation education to students that smoke under the age of 18 in order to allow such students to accept the assistance in anti-smoking and smoking rejection skills as well as the guidance on the method for quitting smoking. In addition, the number of hours of such education shall not be less than 3 hours, and for those making repetitive violation within 1 year, the number of hours of the smoking cessation education should be extended. According to the 2018 Global Youth Tobacco Survey, smoking rate of junior high and vocational school students was 2.8% (4.0% for boys and 1.4% for girls) which would be an improvement when compared to the 2016 smoking rate of 3.7% (5.1% for boys and 2.1% for girls). The smoking rate of senior high school students was 8.0% in 2018 (11.3% for boys and 4.4% for girls) which represents a slight decrease compared to 9.3% in 2016 (13.1% for boys and 5.2% for girls). In the future, the HPA will continue to cooperate closely with the Ministry of Education in establishing quantified specific objective, guidance and evaluation guidelines, conducting school Tobacco Hazards Prevention Act random inspection operation, continuously performing the training for smoking cessation education seed teachers in all county and city schools, expanding school Tobacco Hazards Prevention Act promotion activities, creating smoke-free environments in the school and implementing smoking cessation educations in order to strengthen the works for smoke- free campuses. Health Promoting School international certification project According to the "School Health Act" and "the Tobacco Hazards Prevention Act", schools below the level of senior high school shall implement prohibitions on smoking for both indoor and outdoor areas in the school entirely. The HPA conducted the "Health Promotion School International Certification Program" together with the Ministry of Education in 2017 and incorporated outcomes of important issues of tobacco control into the school certification standard. Tobacco control in colleges and universities The Tobacco Hazards Prevention Act requires a complete prohibition of smoking in all indoor spaces and all outdoor spaces with the exception of designated outdoor smoking areas in colleges and universities. Smoking is completely prohibited outdoors if non-smoking areas have been designated therein. According to the results of the 2014 Investigation on smoking behavior of college and university students and faculty, 6.8% of students smoked. Exposure to second- hand smoke in the campus could be up to 48.4%, indicating that there were plenty of rooms for improvement for tobacco control in school campuses. Therefore, the "Project for Tobacco Control Work in Youth Group Area" is actively implemented, hoping that, under the principle of respecting the self-governance of colleges and universities, schools can be encouraged to actively enhance the tobacco control work in order to establish the knowledge and skills of the college students in tobacco control and to autonomously create a healthy and smoke-free campus culture. Through tobacco control studies and training, the knowledge and skills of the students on tobacco hazards can be improved. In addition, based on the current status of the tobacco control of each school,