Anti-Smoking Efforts Failing O.C.’s Asians

Peter Nguyen took a drag on his cigarette, then closed his eyes as he savored the warmth, the calmness that soothes his soul.

His soul, the two-pack-a-day Westminster smoker emphasized as he slowly exhaled.

“In the morning when I drink coffee, I have to have it. After a meal, I need it,” Nguyen, 45, said Friday afternoon while sitting outside Asian Garden Mall surrounded by a few other smokers. “I want to quit. I’ve tried to quit, but every time I do, I miss it. I love the taste, the high of it.”

Despite aggressive efforts to cut smoking among Asian Americans, people such as Nguyen continue to puff away, according to preliminary findings of a report commissioned by the state Department of Health Services released this week. Anti-smoking advocates say Asian culture and the tobacco industry’s relentless advertising campaign are mostly to blame.

The survey, conducted by UC San Diego, found that Asian Americans were among those groups in which a decline in the number of smokers had stopped over the past three years.

The other groups include those age 18-24, those with less than a high school education and African Americans.

The report also found that the number of adult smokers in California has increased within the past three years, and smoking among the state’s minors has remained unchanged.

John Pierce, the UCSD professor who supervised the survey of more than 78,000 Californians, said when the report is finalized in June, he expects that the number of Asian-American smokers from 1993 to 1996 may have slightly increased. Exact figures were not available Friday.

For Asian American outreach workers, this is grim news, given that the communities have launched several programs in the past few years to curb smoking among immigrants, often heavy smokers in their native countries.

“We should worry because we find that many, many people smoke in the Asian Pacific American communities, and yet despite some of the [smoking prevention] activities, the numbers don’t go down,” said Emily Chen, project coordinator for Asian Pacific Health Care Venture, a Los Angeles-based agency. “This is a big concern.”

Among the community programs are one-on-one counseling sessions within ethnic neighborhoods, community events featuring smoking cessation programs and classes, and telephone help-lines in the native languages.

“It helps the people when they have someone to talk to about some of their stress and some of their problems,” said Debra Tsai, executive director of the Chinese American Cancer Foundation, which runs a Mandarin-language help-line in Orange and Los Angeles counties.

Community outreach workers say trying to get Asian immigrants to quit is difficult because smoking is such an integral part of Asian cultures.

“It’s almost a cultural norm for the men [to smoke],” said Sam Ho, associate director of the Vietnamese Community of Orange County, a Santa Ana-based social services group that recently received a $299,000 grant from the state to design a smoking prevention program for Asian Americans.

“Young kids pick up that habit because they want to act like an adult. And adults, well, they’ve been smoking for a long, long time.”

Meanwhile, the tobacco industry, besieged at home by anti-smoking advocates, has increased its marketing campaign in Asian countries, where smoking is hip for the young and a symbol of respected adulthood for the old.

Simultaneously, outreach workers maintained, the tobacco industry added more foreign-language billboards in this country.

According to statistics compiled by the Asian and Pacific Islander Tobacco Education Network, a San Francisco-based consortium of tobacco prevention agencies, a 1992 study found Asian neighborhoods had 17 times the number of cigarette billboards than white neighborhoods.

“Millions of dollars have been invested to influence the mentality of the people,” Ho said. “Even if we have programs to deal with prevention, usually that range is less that $50,000 to $100,000 a year. How can we compete with the industry that is investing millions of dollars?”

The Tobacco Institute, a Washington-based trade association of tobacco product manufacturers, denied the industry targeted Asians.

“The Asian communities like other communities are important marketing segments,” said Tom Lauria, a spokesman for the institute. “They’re important viable economic groups. They’re certainly capable of deciding for themselves whether they can smoke or drink or anything.”

Recognizing the formidable fight they have against the powerful tobacco industry, Asian American community outreach workers say they will continue to apply for grants and funding to finance programs to combat smoking within their communities.

The Vietnamese Community of Orange County plans to use part of its state grant to persuade merchants to place cigarette advertisements in parts of their stores where minors are less likely to see them.

The Asian and Pacific Islander Tobacco Education Network will begin a statewide “World No Tobacco Abuse Day” on May 31.

But even for those who have gotten the message, quitting will be difficult.

Chi Le, a 65-year-old Westminster resident who has smoked for more than 40 years should know. He’s quit hundreds of times.

And he’s about to do it again--”after this one last cigarette I just borrowed from a friend because I just needed one more taste.

“I’ve promised myself this is it because my children and wife don’t like it, and I know all about the danger of smoking,” he said with a sheepish smile. “This is my last cigarette,” he repeated.

How can he be so sure?

“I’m sure,” he said resolutely.

He took a puff. “I’ll try . . .”