Faith Tahuri started smoking when she was at school because it was "the cool thing to do".
The 27-year-old from Whakatāne said her smoking was at its worst when she started working in a shearing shed.
"That was just your life - you go to work, you smoke hard, you drink hard."
The wahine Māori is sharing her story today for World Smokefree Day - a day to raise awareness and contribute to the achievement of Smokefree Aotearoa 2025, according to Smokefree New Zealand.
The Government's goal is for less than five per cent of New Zealanders to be smokers by 2025.
For Tahuri, World Smokefree Day was about "the next generation". She said New Zealand was tracking "really well" towards reaching the Smokefree Aotearoa 2025 goal.
"Even my mum and dad - they don't smoke now, so that's a bonus.
"To see the difference with my mum not smoking now - she's [got] so much spare money and time to spend with her next generation."
Tahuri's journey to quit smoking inspired her to become a 'stop smoking' practitioner for Hāpainga - a smoke-free support service based in the Bay of Plenty.
Tahuri had her first daughter when she was 17. She moved away from her parents to live with her boyfriend, where she got a job in a shearing shed.
She eventually moved back home and was a solo mother. She kept smoking until she had her second child when she was 22.
"He was born premature - he was small, underweight, he had to spend time in the [neonatal intensive care unit].
"And that was a contributing factor to the fact that I had smoked during my pregnancy with him.
"I just thought, this isn't cool. It wasn't good on the pocket either. I didn't have a job, I was a stay-at-home mum on benefit."
She said her son being born prematurely was an "eye-opener".
"When you see them in their little incubators and they're gasping for breath ... and that's what it is, it's that eye-opener. I was part of making that happen."
She immediately stopped smoking.
"It was a done deal as soon as he was born."
Tahuri has been smoke-free for about five years now. As a stop-smoking practitioner for Hāpainga, she sees clients who were seeking support to quit.
The service runs a wahine group for women aged 18 - 30 to empower them to quit smoking.
"You don't have to quit while you're in the group but it's to give you the motivation and to show them you're not alone."
She said support for clients was individualised - clients could visit their clinics or the practitioners could see them at their homes. Hāpainga also provided petrol vouchers to those who lived rurally and wanted to go into town to the clinic.
"So it's getting over those barriers."
Waikato/Bay of Plenty Cancer Society health promotion co-ordinator Kate Mason said smoking caused more than 20 per cent of all cancer deaths each year.
Smoking was the "number one" cause of lung cancer, but it could also cause cancer in the mouth, throat, bowel, kidney, liver, pancreas, stomach, bladder, cervix and ovaries.
Mason said New Zealand was "closing in" on the 2025 target for a Smokefree Aotearoa but there was "still a long way to go".
About 9.4 per cent of New Zealand adults still smoked every day – this was down from 18 per cent 10 years ago, Mason said.
"But for some communities, smoking rates remain high – as much as 24 per cent for Māori women.
"A Smokefree Aotearoa will go a long way in reducing the impact and incidence of cancer on families."
According to the Ministry of Health, around 5000 people died each year in New Zealand because of smoking or second-hand smoke exposure. That is 13 people a day.
Ministry of Health statistics showed the current smoking rate of New Zealand adults was 10.9 per cent for 2020/21. For the previous year, it was 13.7 per cent.
A Ministry of Health spokesperson said there had been a decrease in smoking rates among Māori and Pacific peoples, but daily smoking prevalence rates among Māori were more than three times higher for non-Māori.
This disproportionately increased the risk to health from smoking-related diseases such as asthma for some groups.
"Reducing smoking rates amongst Māori and Pacific populations and pregnant women continues to be a priority for the Ministry and is embedded in the Smokefree Aotearoa 2025 action plan."
The spokesperson said current tobacco control measures were largely focused on "changing individual behaviours".
While important, this approach had not worked for everyone and smoking rates had reduced faster among those with access to greater resources.
The onus of responsibility for reducing smoking rates should not sit with the individuals who smoked, the spokesperson said.
"The action plan includes legislative change which will focus on radically changing the smoking environment to make it easy for all New Zealanders to live Smokefree, by tackling everything about the product including where it is sold and what is in it."
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