Youth Unity organisation suggests exchanging cigarettes for chocolate

Supported by the United Russia party, the all-Russian public organisation Youth Unity intends to run an anti-smoking propaganda campaign, Strong Russia-Healthy Russia.

The Youth Unity press service reported that on June 27th, on Youth Day, boys and girls would go to the streets of Moscow, St. Petersburg, Krasnoyarsk, Krasnodar, Vologda, Voronezh, Kaliningrad, Kazan, Yekaterinburg and other large cities of Russia and address both young people and adults with a suggestion to exchange cigarettes for chocolate.

In this way the anti-smoking campaigners will try to draw smokers' attention to the fact that every year 4 million people die of cancer of the lungs caused by smoking.

The press service stressed that smoking was turning to an epidemic in Russia, which brings the nation to the brink of degradation and extinction. People start to smoke in childhood and half of all senior pupils are heavy smokers. In Russia, smoking kills 300,000 people a year.