Smoke-free school campaign kicks off

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Smoking in schools may become a thing of the past now as the Indonesian AIDS Foundation (YAI) has launched a campaign to make high schools in Jakarta non-smoking zones.

The foundation, whose primary concern is preventing the spread of HIV/AIDS, will select three schools out of 41 across the city which have registered for the non-smoking school award program. The foundation cites studies that show that children who smoke early in life are more likely to take drugs.

"The selected schools will receive a total of Rp 100 million in the award program," said YAI executive Martina Widjaja in a press conference on Saturday.

Martina said the committee was prepared to monitor 150 schools, but only 41 schools declared their readiness to sign up for the program, the registration for which opened early in May and closed last Monday.

Beginning June 1 until November, over 100 volunteers will make impromptu visits to the registered schools.

"In the assessment, we will also see if the schools still allow guests and teachers to smoke in the compound," Martina said.

The award program is being conducted in cooperation with the Ministry of National Education and the National Commission on Eradicating Smoking.

It was aimed at discouraging high school students from starting to smoke during their school years.

Surveys show that young drug users started to smoke while at school before trying drugs.

The survey findings, which have become the basis of the strategy of the government and non-governmental organizations in programs to prevent the spread of HIV/AIDS, also found that most people living with HIV/AIDS in Indonesia were young injecting drug users.

Among the schools taking part in the project, are Al Azhar high school in Bumi Serpong Damai, Tangerang, Gonzaga high school and SMA 1 state high school in Jakarta, and Regina Pacis high school in Bogor.