Smokers get raw deal

Tobacco smoking costs the Irish state 140 times more each year than the amount spent trying to get people to give up the habit, according to a story by Sarah Burns for The Irish Times and quoting the Irish Heart Foundation.

About €11.8 million was reportedly spent in 2017 on smoking cessation measures including medications, services, the national quit-line and media campaigns, while it was estimated that costs related to the impact of smoking totaled €1.65 billion.

These figures, which were based on a reply to a parliamentary question and an assessment of the economic cost of smoking in Ireland commissioned by the Department of Health, were published by the Foundation on National No Smoking Day.

The amount spent helping people to quit was less than one percent of the almost €1.4 billion smokers paid in tobacco tax during 2017, the Foundation said.

“Nowhere near enough is being done to help the estimated 80 percent of smokers who want to quit,” said Chris Macey, the Foundation’s head of advocacy. “Tax increases have played an important role in reducing smoking rates in Ireland but could be even more effective if a higher proportion of the proceeds was spent on cessation services.”

“It isn’t fair to place a large additional tax burden on people because of their addiction to nicotine and then fail to invest properly in helping them overcome it when many are desperate to quit.”

Macey said that putting more resources into smoking cessation services would help to reduce the number of deaths from tobacco-related illness in Ireland, which he said was 16 per day.