More people die each year due to the harmful effects of cigarettes than from HIV, illegal drug use, alcohol, car accidents, and gun-related incidents combined. Cigarettes are especially addictive to adolescent brains that are not yet mature. People who start smoking in childhood often become lifelong smokers and have a difficult time quitting later on. For this reason, strict guidelines limit tobacco advertising to children and it is illegal to sell tobacco products to people under the age of 21 in all U.S. states. As of 2019, an estimated 2,500 children under 18 years of age smoke their first cigarette each day, and approximately 400 of them will become regular smokers.

Not only do many people start smoking as children, but thousands of children also work picking tobacco, the plant that is used to make cigarettes! In the U.S., children as young as 12 can work on farms. Children who pick tobacco often report headaches, nausea, and dizziness. These are unambiguous signs of nicotine poisoning due to high levels of nicotine, the highly addictive chemical in cigarettes, absorbed through the skin. Toxic pesticides and heavy machinery present additional dangers to those picking tobacco.

Option 1:

Which expression could be used to calculate the estimated number of children who become regular smokers each year?

A. 400 + 365

B. 2,500 ÷ 400

C. 365 × 2,500

D. 365 × 400

Option 2:

A group of children working on the Golden Dew Tobacco Farm was interviewed about how old they had been when they started picking tobacco. Their answers are below. Find the mean, median, and mode for this data set.

{12, 15, 13, 12, 14, 13, 13, 12, 14, 13}

Discussion Question:

Guidelines that restrict tobacco marketing are meant to protect young people from the harmful effects of smoking. At the age of 21, young people achieve a new status at which they are considered mature enough to assume the risks of tobacco use. But children as young as 12 can work in tobacco fields to earn money, often under dangerous conditions. Why are the same children who work in tobacco fields considered too young to buy tobacco in a store? Should there be one age at which children can buy tobacco and work in tobacco fields? Or should things stay the way they are?