When I was working in Singapore, the then Prime Minister was rolling out his programme to make the island a smoke-free zone.
I witnessed first-hand the draconian measures he employed to coerce the population to quit, including fines for smoking in the street and schoolchildren being taught how to discourage their parents from smoking (say you don’t want them to die).
He succeeded. Will we?
The government’s ambitious target is for England to be smoke-free by 2030 and for Scotland by 2034.
Smoking is on course to kill around one billion people in the 21st century and is the leading preventable cause of disease and death.
The adult smoking rate in England is now 14.4% – down from 19.3% five years ago – but this still represents six million smokers.
We’ve made progress in tackling smoking through taxation on tobacco and introducing standardised packaging, as well as smoke-free legislation, including a ban on smoking in cars with children present.
Nicholas S Hopkinson of Imperial College London describes in the BMJ a new plan to tackle smoking.
The plan is that the tobacco industry would pay for the harm it causes by introducing a “polluter pays” levy on tobacco companies that will feed into a smoke-free 2030 fund.
Daily Mirror news
This fund would support media campaigns, trading standards enforcement and universal effective treatment for tobacco dependence.
Money would be raised from companies in proportion to their market share and the fund administered without any industry input, so the tobacco industry has no role in the setting up of or implementing policy.
Beyond ensuring a secure source of funding, what else needs to be done?
Preventing children from taking up smoking is essential to deliver a smoke-free future and lower the risk of future ill health.
Increasing the age of sale from 16 to 18 in 2007 saw a fall in child smoking. A further increase from 18 to 21 would drive additional reductions.
In the US, “tobacco 21” policies have been shown to contribute to a greater decline in youth smoking and are now implemented in all states.
Tough controls on advertising mean that pack inserts and cigarettes are the last available platforms on which the tobacco industry can promote products.
Work in Canada has shown putting affirmative messages about quitting and links to smoking cessation services deters smoking, so why not here? A requirement for “dissuasive cigarettes” – which are in unappealing colours or carry health messages on the cigarette paper – should also be introduced.
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