29 Aug 2013

The tobacco industry has become more aggressive than ever in interfering with government efforts to protect public health.

The deputy permanent secretary in the Ministry of Health, Dr Sheenaz El Halabi, said this on Tuesday during a workshop to sensitise and capacitate media practitioners on tobacco control. Dr El Halabi said the tobacco industry used its economic power to lobby and to propagate the sale and distribution of its products.

“One of the statistics that the tobacco industry is active on the ground in Botswana is corporate social responsibility tactics, which is basically to improve its corporate image with the public, press and regulators who increasingly have grown to view it as a merchant of death,” she said. She said this called on the stakeholders to build a stronger partnership, particularly with the news media because the public depended on it for information.

She said media coverage on the environment that is free of tobacco smoke, tobacco industry interference and its corporate social responsibility tactics, illicit trade on tobacco could help public make informed choices. “Tobacco use should be shunned by all,” she said. “We must all become uncomfortable when we see someone smoke in a public space.”

She also said Batswana should also be uncomfortable with street vendors selling tobacco near schools where students and other youth would be enticed. The deputy permanent secretary said the community should shun the tobacco industry for promoting a product that impoverishes the nation, spread disease and caused death. She added that Botswana was in the final stage of developing tobacco control legislation.

Ms Gaesi Mophuting-Maviya, the acting board chairperson of the Anti-Tobacco Network (ANT), said the health risks of tobacco were undermined by the public and those responsible for protecting and promoting public health. This is despite that the risks of smoking are high compared to other risks faced in everyday life.

“Widespread underestimation of the risks associated with tobacco use, is a major reason why tobacco products are still widely available and why lenient tobacco policies have been allowed to occur,” he said. Ms Mophuting-Maviya said the government took stringent action against alcohol abuse by, among other things, imposing an alcohol levy. “These very vital interventions are not as evident in tobacco control and to date tobacco products are available at every corner of the street,” she said.

Meanwhile, the workshop participants said they supported the idea of introducing a tobacco levy as part of the effort to curb usage. ENDS