Schoolgirl Maya promotes no smoking

Smoking ban

Now in England
smoking is banned
One effect is yellow hands.
Your lungs go black,
your face goes red.
Sooner or later you will be dead.
The smokey smells are really bad.
They make you feel really mad.
Your clothes will smell
Your breath will stink
Then your lungs will not be pink.
Now in England smoking is banned
For a good reason
Do you understand?

A ten year old Nottingham girl’s poem about England’s smokefree policy has caught the attention of the Department of Health and been commended for its messages about the effects of smoking.

Maya Lubczynskyj, who lives in Kimberley, wrote the poem in response to a competition being run at Larkfields Junior School in Nuthall where she is now a year six pupil. Her stepfather persuaded her to send it to the Nottingham Evening Post where it was printed in the readers’ Your Poems column.

Kath Childs, Senior Public Health Manager at the East Midlands Directorate of Public Health said: “We were delighted to see this poem published and that the no smoking message is so important to children like Maya and her family. Her initiative is an inspiration to others.”

Christine Harvey, Tobacco Alliance Co-ordinator, Smokefree Nottinghamshire visited the school to present Maya with a book token to thank her for the poem and to meet other children who had designed posters on the No Smoking theme. Photograph shows (left to right) Larkfields Junior School Head Teacher Peter Taylor; teacher Jan Beale; Maya, Maya’s mother Kate Feenan and Christine Harvey.

Maya’s mother Kate Feenan said the whole family is passionate about the stop smoking messages. Maya and her classmates had been learning about the dangers of smoking and taking drugs as part of an educational programme introduced to the school by teacher Janette Beale. The children had the opportunity to design a poster or write a poem about the smokefree legislation as part of a competition organised by Liz Pierce, Health Improvement Practitioner (Broxtowe), part of the Nottinghamshire County Primary Care Trust (PCT).

Mrs Beale, herself the mother of three school age boys, is pleased the way the no smoking message has clearly had impact on the children she teaches. She reports that several have been encouraging parents and friends to kick the habit.

It is now hoped that Maya’s efforts and those of her schoolfriends will get further exposure as part of the Department of Health’s on-going no- smoking messages.

Kath Childs added: “Getting the right messages across to children and young people about the dangers of smoking to health is so important. We shall be engaging in further promotional activity over the coming months involving the Healthy Schools programme and other young people’s activities.”