CIGARETTE SMOKING AMONG SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTS IN MAURITIUS - A PILOT STUDY

In this work, we aimed to study the existence of any relationship between knowledge about health effects of Cigarette smoking and the intention to quit smoking among Mauritian secondary schools students. The objectives were to identify the prevalence of intention to quit smoking among current smokers, determine smokers knowledge about health hazards of smoking and to assess the impact of knowledge about health risk of smoking on the intention to quit smoking. A survey was carried out by means of questionnaires which were distributed to the secondary school students. Statistical analysis was performed using SPSS, version 24. The findings of the study revealed that 85% of current smoker had an intention to quit smoking; it was also found that none of the smoker had complete awareness towards all the health effects of smoking assessed and a direct linear relationship between knowledge about health hazards of smoking and intention to quit smoking was noted (Pearson correlation coefficient, r = 0.729)