World Cancer Campaign Builds Momentum Globally with International Initiative to Protect Children From Second...( The Lance Armstrong Foundation jo...),Health

The Lance Armstrong Foundation joins first global effort focusing on

dangers of parental smoking in homes and cars

AUSTIN, Texas, Feb. 4 /PRNewswire/ -- In the first global initiative of its kind, the Lance Armstrong Foundation (LAF) and the International Union Against Cancer (UICC), a global consortium of cancer-fighting organizations, will lead a year-long communication, education and advocacy effort to promote smoke-free environments for children. "I love my smoke-free childhood" will launch today, World Cancer Day. The campaign will encourage parents to avoid smoking at home or in a car; avoid smoking while pregnant or in the vicinity of someone who is pregnant; use a smoke-free daycare; and avoid smoking altogether. The initiative will also incite parents to caution their children to stay away from second-hand smoke and places that allow smoking and teach them that there is no safe level of second-hand smoke.

"There is no safe level of exposure to secondhand smoke and brief exposure can be harmful. This is the driving message of the initiative," says Claire Neal, the LAF's director of education and program development. "Working together, we will advance awareness of the health risks of secondhand smoke to children and contribute to a healthier society for generations to come."

"I love my smoke-free childhood" marks the first full-year focus on a cancer-prevention habit endorsed by the World Cancer Campaign, a five-year movement launched globally on World Cancer Day 2007. The Campaign spreads knowledge about how parents can prevent cancer in their children later in life by learning about vaccines for virus-related liver and cervical cancers; providing them with a smoke-free environment; protecting them from over- exposure to the sun; and encouraging them to be physically active and eat a healthy diet in order to avoid obesity.

"Forty percent of cancers are preventable through healthy habits," says Isabel Mortar
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