Dr Margaret Chan, Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO) is calling on governments to impose heavier taxes on tobacco products to help ‘bear the costs of health care’.

 

In an address on the WHO website which was also published in the Washington Post on 2 October, Chan said that for the first time, new global Sustainable Development Goals currently being negotiated at the United Nations will treat tobacco use as a development issue.

 

She said: “Around the world, some 6m people die every year from a tobacco-related disease. That’s equivalent to 1 person every 6 seconds, or 10 people every minute.

 

“By 2030, it’s expected that 8m people a year will die from tobacco use – and 80%of those deaths will occur in developing countries. In the United States of America alone, smoking related illnesses result in US$170 billion in medical care spending each year.

 

 

“Yet the cause of these problems – tobacco sales – could also contribute to a solution. The tobacco industry, which generates more than $35bn in annual profits, ought to bear the costs it inflicts upon society. And there is a straightforward way to ensure that it does: taxation. Why, after all, should governments effectively subsidize tobacco companies by picking up the tab for the health care costs they generate?”

 

Chan claims that raising taxes on cigarettes and other tobacco products has ‘proven incredibly successful’ as a strategy for reducing usage and she points to South Africa, France and New Zealand as examples where tobacco taxes have helped to cut tobacco use and provided funding for health care.

 

She also pointed to The Philippines’ Sin Tax Reform Law introduced in 2012, which increased tax rates on low-priced cigarette brands by more than 300%, with the revenue generated used to finance the country’s universal health care insurance programme.

 

Chan also pointed to the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) ‘as an important and effective means to reduce tobacco consumption’ and said this even provides guidelines for governments to put in place ‘to strengthen tobacco taxes’.

 

She concluded by saying that the United Nations ‘ought to encourage countries to raise tobacco taxes to support the world’s development goals and reduce tobacco use’.

 

The full article by Margaret Chan can be accessed at the World Health Organization’s website at the following link: http://www.who.int/mediacentre/commentaries/tobacco-as-development-issue/en/