Category: People

Tobacco use down in India
Tobacco use in India has dropped by six percentage points in under 10 years, according to a story in the New Indian Express.
Figures from the Global Adult Tobacco Survey, 2016-2017, indicate that tobacco use fell in India from 34.6 percent to 28.6 percent between 2009-10 and 2016-17.
Three North-eastern states, Assam, Tripura and Manipur, however, saw increases in tobacco use despite anti-tobacco laws and a ban enforced by militants, the Express story said. In Assam, tobacco use rose from 39.3 percent to 48.2 percent, while in in Tripura it increased from 55.9 percent to 64.5 percent, and in Manipur it went up from 54.1 percent to 55.1 percent.
India’s other states saw falls in tobacco use. In Nagaland, it fell from 31.5 percent to 13.2 percent, and in Sikkim, it fell from 41.6 percent to 17.9 percent.
Meanwhile, smoking prevalence in India has fallen from 14 percent to 10.7 percent.
And the chewing of smokeless tobacco (SLT) has gone down from 25.9 percent to 21.4 percent nationally.
‘The remarkable achievement has been in reduction in exposure to second-hand smoke at home, which is from 52.3 percent to 38.7 percent, and in any public place from 29 per cent to 23 percent,’ the report said.
November 27, 2017
Tax change hits local sales
The Thailand Tobacco Monopoly (TTM) has asked the Finance Ministry to reconsider its new excise-tax structure, according to a story in The Bangkok Post.
Under the new structure, TTM’s sales during the current fiscal year, which started on October 1 and which will end on September 30, 2018, are estimated to fall by 41 percent compared to those of the previous fiscal year.
The deputy finance minister Wisudhi Srisuphan said yesterday the ministry was considering TTM’s request for a review of the new structure.
Meanwhile, TTM’s employees are gathering signatures in support of filing a complaint against the ministry with the Administrative Court.
As with the previous tax structure, the new one is based on both quantity and prices, but while the prices used as the basis for previous taxes were ex-factory or declared import prices, now they are based on suggested retail prices. The rates are 20 percent for a pack of cigarettes priced at not more than 60 baht, and 40 percent for a pack priced at more than 60 baht.
After the new rates came into effect in mid-September, importers were said to have cut the suggested retail prices of some types of imported cigarettes to 60 baht a pack to take advantage of the new rates.
And in doing so they have taken market share from the TTM.
November 24, 2017
Minimum pricing mooted
Setting a minimum price for tobacco products could be used as part of a campaign to reduce the number of smokers in Scotland, according to a BBC Online story.
The proposal was made after the Scottish government announced it would introduce minimum alcohol pricing from next May.
Public health experts in Scotland are suggesting, too, that raising the price of tobacco products and reducing their availability, in part by incentivising retailers not to sell them, might help tackle health inequalities.
NHS [National Health Service] Health Scotland and the Scottish Collaboration for Public Health Research and Policy (SCPHRP) at the University of Edinburgh have put forward these and other ideas as part of a new national tobacco strategy.
They want to see also mass media campaigns to encourage smokers to stop, and to reduce exposure to second-hand smoke.
They recommend that effective policy actions should focus on reducing health inequalities.
Twenty-one percent of adults in Scotland smoke, down from 28 percent in 2003.
However, adult smoking levels have been static since 2013.
And rates are still highest in the financially poorer areas of the country, with 35 percent of adults in the least well-off areas smoking compared to 10 percent in the most well-off areas.
Dr. Garth Reid, principal public health adviser at NHS Health Scotland and one of the study’s authors, said Scotland’s health was improving but that the gap between the health of the best and least well-off was widening.
NHS Scotland claims that smoking causes more than 10,000 deaths a year.
November 24, 2017
Young buy into illegal trade
Figures from a new survey show that more than half of all teenage smokers in the north-east of England have bought illicit tobacco products, according to a story in The Conversation.
The figures, from the 2017 North East Illegal Tobacco Survey, found that 55 percent of smokers between the ages of 14 and 15 said they had bought illicit tobacco products from shops or “tab houses”, while 73 percent said they had been offered illicit tobacco products at some point.
The Conversation story said there had been cases of illicit tobacco being sold to children from ice-cream vans.
And sometimes these sales were of single sticks, which were much easier for young people to buy with their pocket money.
The Conversation reported that because they were generally cheaper than were licit products, illicit products could discourage people from deciding to give up smoking.
But it busted the myth about illicit cigarettes being more harmful than were licit ones.
All cigarettes were harmful to health, it said.
A High Court judgement in 2016 recognised there was no difference in the harm presented by any brand of cigarettes.
In this way, tobacco control advocates often likened any differences between the consumption of licit and illicit cigarettes as being similar to the difference between jumping out of the 12th or 13th floor of a burning building.
The full story is at: https://theconversation.com/nearly-half-of-teenage-smokers-have-bought-illegal-tobacco-so-what-are-the-dangers-85558.
November 24, 2017
Local studies needed
Indonesia needs more studies conducted by local researchers to reveal the impact of tobacco consumption on the nation’s health and health care costs, according to a story in The Jakarta Post citing an Antara News Agency report.
“We have often talked about the impact of tobacco use in the country, but we are just quoting information and data on the matter from reports by researchers in foreign countries,” said the Health Minister, Nila Moeloek.
Now that the National Health Insurance (JKN) program had been implemented in Indonesia, it was easier for researchers to conduct studies into the impact of tobacco consumption on public health and the healthcare costs involved in treating tobacco-related diseases, she said.
The Healthcare and Social Security Agency data had shown that 20-25 percent of JKN expenditure went to the treatment of non-communicable diseases related to tobacco consumption, such as cardiovascular diseases and lung cancer.
Nila said a study conducted by the Russian government found that the high incidence of tuberculosis in that country was related to alcohol and tobacco consumption.
“It’s probable that our researchers can conduct such a study given the high number of smokers in Indonesia,” she added.
November 24, 2017
Farmers lose out
In Tanzania, ‘excess tobacco’ is rotting as the government and potential buyers haggle over what price it should fetch, according to a story in The Citizen relayed by the TMA.
The tobacco was grown by members of the Amahoro Tobacco Primary Co-operative Society at Ulyankulu in the Tabora Region.
In negotiations that are said to have dragged on, the potential buyers have offered to pay $1.35 per kg, while the government believes it is worth $1.75 per kg.
But nature might resolve the issue.
The chairman of the co-operative, Fulgence Erasto, said that, with ongoing rain, the tobacco had started accumulating moisture and rotting.
“Look, this tobacco is no longer suitable for the market,” he said.
“This is a loss to the farmers.”
November 23, 2017
UK taxing the poor
UK campaigners have responded with anger to the announcement of another increase in tobacco duty.
“This is the second increase this year,” said Simon Clark, director of the smokers’ group Forest. “Tobacco duty is already punitively high. A further tax hike discriminates against smokers who are less well off. Once again the poor are being sacrificed on the altar of public health.
“The prime minister famously said her government wanted to help those who are just about managing. Instead of helping, the chancellor will push more people into poverty unless they quit smoking or turn to the black market.
“Thanks to the chancellor more and more smokers will buy illicit tobacco at home or purchase their tobacco abroad. The loss of revenue to the treasury will far outweigh any health benefits to the nation.”
Meanwhile, the director general of the UK’s Tobacco Manufacturers’ Association, Giles Roca, said there had been, in effect, three tobacco-price increases already this year: that caused by a March-budget increase, that caused by a ban on small packs and that caused by the introduction of a minimum excise tax.
“Today’s [Wednesday’s] announcement will simply lose taxpayers money, push ever more smokers to avoid paying UK duty and boost the black market and the criminal gangs that operate it,” said Roca.
“The most effective way to get smokers to quit is not high tax but the development of new products such as e-cigarettes.
“Also, such an increase, just before the crucial Christmas trading period, will significantly impact on retailers including many corner shops for whom tobacco makes up around 35 percent of their business.”
November 23, 2017
Smokers given a voice
The Indonesian Cigarette Consumers’ Society (LKRI), which was formed in Semarang on Tuesday, claims to be the voice of the country’s smokers, according to a tempo.com story.
LKRI’s founders apparently decided that smokers in Indonesia needed a unified voice to help counter the discrimination that was being aimed at them.
In part, that discrimination had manifested itself in the fact that smokers were not covered by state healthcare insurance (BPJS).
The chairman of LKRI, Agus Condro Prayitn, said during the launch of the society that smokers had greatly contributed to the country.
Through them, the government was able to generate Rp135 trillion in cigarette tax.
Nevertheless, smokers received the least attention from the government of any group, accept when it came to discrimination.
Agus said that cigarette excise tax was expected to generate Rp138 trillion by the year’s end, and that the Finance Ministry had decided to raise that Rp148 trillion for 2018.
So the LKRI has urged smokers to fight for their rights as the country’s revenue contributor.
During the launch, human rights activist Hendardi said that cigarettes and smoking were not crimes and, in fact, were hugely helpful to tobacco farmers.
November 23, 2017
Teenage smoking plummets
The smoking rate among New Zealand teenagers has dropped by a third since last year, according to a Radio New Zealand story citing Ministry of Health figures.
The country’s Quitline was quoted as saying that this year 8,000 15-17-year-olds ‘are smoking’, down from 12,000 last year. A decade ago there were said to have been 35,000 in this age group ‘taking up the habit’.
Quitline’s clinical director Sharryn Gannon said the majority of young people were not picking up cigarettes – a trend that was creating “a new generation of ‘never-smokers’”.
Gannon said the average smoker took up the habit at age 14, and that if people could make it to age 25 without taking up smoking then it was likely they would never smoke.
Meanwhile, the overall smoking rate in New Zealand also has decreased, a decrease that included a five percent reduction among Maori men during the past two years.
Gannon said the increasing price of cigarettes and the availability of e-cigarettes were also reasons why people were quitting the habit.
November 20, 2017
JT ‘appointment’ unofficial
Japan Tobacco Inc. said today it was not the source of a recent media story about the appointment of a new president, CEO and representative director of JTI.
JTI said it would make an announcement ‘if and when it becomes necessary’.
The Japan Times, quoting ‘sources’, reported yesterday that Masamichi Terabatake, an executive at JT’s international operations, was to succeed president Mitsuomi Koizumi.
‘The leadership change comes as Japan Tobacco, which holds about 60 percent of the domestic cigarette market, seeks to expand its global reach amid falling demand at home caused by a health boom and the growing popularity of heat-not-burn tobacco products,’ the Times said.
‘At 51, Terabatake will become the company’s youngest president since it was established through the 1985 privatization of the Japanese state monopoly. He is currently deputy CEO of Geneva-based Japan Tobacco International SA.
‘The personnel decision could be finalized by Japan Tobacco’s board by the end of the month and would then be subject to approval at a general shareholders’ meeting in March,’ the sources said.
November 20, 2017