We Can Eradicate the Global Scourge of Tobacco
We Can Eradicate the Global Scourge of Tobacco
The world is facing a pandemic of epic proportions. Tobacco, the only consumer product proven to kill more than half of its regular users, will be responsible for 4.9 million deaths worldwide this year alone. Today, that burden is fairly evenly shared by industrialized and developing nations. If current trends continue, however, the cancer burden in the developing world will more than triple in the next 25 yearsresulting in a global total of 10 million deaths worldwide each and every year. Seven million of these will occur in the developing world, in the nations least prepared to deal with the financial, social, and political consequences of this global public health tragedy.
If we fail to act to prevent this tragedy, the consequences will most certainly be dire. Five hundred million people alive today, 250 million of them children, will die as a direct result of tobacco use. Half of these people will die in middle agewhen they are most productive for their economies, their societies, and their families. In the last century alone, tobacco use killed 100 million smokers. If left unchecked, tobacco use will kill more than a billion people in this century.
This extraordinary suffering and death is not inevitable, however. Without intervention, the tobacco pandemic will be the worst case of avoidable loss of life in recorded history. Yet, with comprehensive, concerted action, we can eliminate the global scourge of tobacco and save hundreds of millions of lives within the next few decades.
How will we do it? We must help current smokers quit and prevent the tobacco industry from using its nefarious marketing techniques to lure more of the world's children into deadly addiction. If we choose to act, the number of lives saved could potentially be astronomical. For example, if we were able to cut adult cigarette consumption by just 50 percent worldwide, we could avert more than 200 million needless deaths within the next 50 years. That's 200 million real people...mothers and fathers, children and siblings...people who enrich their cultures, people who sustain their economies, and people who are loved by their families.
And how will we accomplish such a lofty goal? After all, 'Big Tobacco' is a formidable economic and political juggernaut, and it has set its sights squarely on the people of the developing world. As smoking rates decline in the US and many other industrialized nations, the tobacco industry has dramatically stepped up its efforts in emerging markets in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Because tobacco kills the majority of its customer base, the industry must persuade millions to take up smoking each year just to break even. In the unrestricted markets of the developing world, that means that no one is immune from the industry's tactics, especially the most vulnerable people of allchildren.
Today, worldwide, one in seven teens aged 13-15 smokes. A quarter of them tried their first cigarette before the age of 10. Nearly 100,000 children and adolescents become addicted worldwide every day. And it's no wonder. In the US alone, the tobacco industry spends more than one million dollars an hour, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, marketing its products.
Fortunately, thanks to the rigorous educational, scientific, and advocacy efforts of dedicated tobacco control activists worldwide, many nations of the world are taking a stand against tobacco by supporting the world's first global public health treatythe Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC). In fact, the campaign to reduce the global burden of tobacco-related disease celebrated a significant victory in November 2004, when Peru became the 40 nation to ratify the FCTC. Developed by the WHO and formally adopted by the World Health Assembly in 2003, the treaty required ratification by 40 nations before it could become legally binding on the countries that have adopted it. Ratification of the FCTC was a tremendous milestone for global public health, putting us on the track to sparing the millions of lives we know we can save each year just by reducing tobacco consumption.
The FCTC strikes at the core of the tobacco companies by restricting their insidious and immoral marketing tactics. It gives nationsparticularly the low-income nations the tobacco companies have targeted as their most promising marketspowerful new tools to protect their citizens from the tobacco industry's deception. The treaty commits nations to banning all tobacco advertising, promotion, and sponsorship (with an exception for countries with constitutional constraints). It also requires warning labels to cover at least 30 percent of the cigarettes' packaging.
In addition to aggressively combating tobacco marketing, the FCTC requires many other measures to protect the citizens of the world, including shielding citizens from second-hand smoke; increasing tobacco excise taxes; preventing cigarette smuggling; promoting public awareness of the deadly consequences of tobacco use; providing greater access to treatment for nicotine dependence; and providing more stringent regulation of tobacco productsan especially important action because these products will continue to be freely and legitimately available to youths and adults worldwide.
The US is to be commended for supporting adoption of the treaty, but our role as a nation is just beginning. What are the next steps we need to take? We must continue to provide scientific expertise and financial resources to help other countries implement the treaty's critical public health measures. Our redoubled support is crucial to the success of the FCTC. We must empower other nations, within the constraints and parameters of their cultures and constitutions, to safeguard their citizens by implementing, enforcing, and evaluating policies, such as those mandated by the FCTC, that will protect them from tobacco addiction and the disease and death that are its inevitable result. The US must lead by example and ratify the FCTC.
You might wonder why the US should be so involved in this global effort. After all, our smoking rates are declining, and tobacco-related deaths are following suit. Why, then, should we care about smoking rates in developing nations? It's a good question, and there's a good answer. The US has both a strategic and a moral stake in defusing the international tobacco time bomb. Soaring rates of tobacco-related disease and death will harm economic, social, and political development in emerging nations. Just as AIDS might destabilize nations, so might tobacco. In turn, that will deter our efforts to bring security to ourselves and democracy to the world.
Continued support of the FCTC will turn science and policy into action and put the US at the forefront of global tobacco control efforts. When we set an example as world leaders of the tobacco control movement, we will be poised to stem the tide of the tobacco pandemic throughout the world. If we act now, we can head off this looming tragedy and eliminate the global scourge of tobacco.
Please visit http://www.fctcnow.org to voice your support of the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control.
CLICK HERE for subscription information about this journal.
The world is facing a pandemic of epic proportions. Tobacco, the only consumer product proven to kill more than half of its regular users, will be responsible for 4.9 million deaths worldwide this year alone. Today, that burden is fairly evenly shared by industrialized and developing nations. If current trends continue, however, the cancer burden in the developing world will more than triple in the next 25 yearsresulting in a global total of 10 million deaths worldwide each and every year. Seven million of these will occur in the developing world, in the nations least prepared to deal with the financial, social, and political consequences of this global public health tragedy.
If we fail to act to prevent this tragedy, the consequences will most certainly be dire. Five hundred million people alive today, 250 million of them children, will die as a direct result of tobacco use. Half of these people will die in middle agewhen they are most productive for their economies, their societies, and their families. In the last century alone, tobacco use killed 100 million smokers. If left unchecked, tobacco use will kill more than a billion people in this century.
This extraordinary suffering and death is not inevitable, however. Without intervention, the tobacco pandemic will be the worst case of avoidable loss of life in recorded history. Yet, with comprehensive, concerted action, we can eliminate the global scourge of tobacco and save hundreds of millions of lives within the next few decades.
How will we do it? We must help current smokers quit and prevent the tobacco industry from using its nefarious marketing techniques to lure more of the world's children into deadly addiction. If we choose to act, the number of lives saved could potentially be astronomical. For example, if we were able to cut adult cigarette consumption by just 50 percent worldwide, we could avert more than 200 million needless deaths within the next 50 years. That's 200 million real people...mothers and fathers, children and siblings...people who enrich their cultures, people who sustain their economies, and people who are loved by their families.
And how will we accomplish such a lofty goal? After all, 'Big Tobacco' is a formidable economic and political juggernaut, and it has set its sights squarely on the people of the developing world. As smoking rates decline in the US and many other industrialized nations, the tobacco industry has dramatically stepped up its efforts in emerging markets in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Because tobacco kills the majority of its customer base, the industry must persuade millions to take up smoking each year just to break even. In the unrestricted markets of the developing world, that means that no one is immune from the industry's tactics, especially the most vulnerable people of allchildren.
Today, worldwide, one in seven teens aged 13-15 smokes. A quarter of them tried their first cigarette before the age of 10. Nearly 100,000 children and adolescents become addicted worldwide every day. And it's no wonder. In the US alone, the tobacco industry spends more than one million dollars an hour, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, marketing its products.
Fortunately, thanks to the rigorous educational, scientific, and advocacy efforts of dedicated tobacco control activists worldwide, many nations of the world are taking a stand against tobacco by supporting the world's first global public health treatythe Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC). In fact, the campaign to reduce the global burden of tobacco-related disease celebrated a significant victory in November 2004, when Peru became the 40 nation to ratify the FCTC. Developed by the WHO and formally adopted by the World Health Assembly in 2003, the treaty required ratification by 40 nations before it could become legally binding on the countries that have adopted it. Ratification of the FCTC was a tremendous milestone for global public health, putting us on the track to sparing the millions of lives we know we can save each year just by reducing tobacco consumption.
The FCTC strikes at the core of the tobacco companies by restricting their insidious and immoral marketing tactics. It gives nationsparticularly the low-income nations the tobacco companies have targeted as their most promising marketspowerful new tools to protect their citizens from the tobacco industry's deception. The treaty commits nations to banning all tobacco advertising, promotion, and sponsorship (with an exception for countries with constitutional constraints). It also requires warning labels to cover at least 30 percent of the cigarettes' packaging.
In addition to aggressively combating tobacco marketing, the FCTC requires many other measures to protect the citizens of the world, including shielding citizens from second-hand smoke; increasing tobacco excise taxes; preventing cigarette smuggling; promoting public awareness of the deadly consequences of tobacco use; providing greater access to treatment for nicotine dependence; and providing more stringent regulation of tobacco productsan especially important action because these products will continue to be freely and legitimately available to youths and adults worldwide.
The US is to be commended for supporting adoption of the treaty, but our role as a nation is just beginning. What are the next steps we need to take? We must continue to provide scientific expertise and financial resources to help other countries implement the treaty's critical public health measures. Our redoubled support is crucial to the success of the FCTC. We must empower other nations, within the constraints and parameters of their cultures and constitutions, to safeguard their citizens by implementing, enforcing, and evaluating policies, such as those mandated by the FCTC, that will protect them from tobacco addiction and the disease and death that are its inevitable result. The US must lead by example and ratify the FCTC.
You might wonder why the US should be so involved in this global effort. After all, our smoking rates are declining, and tobacco-related deaths are following suit. Why, then, should we care about smoking rates in developing nations? It's a good question, and there's a good answer. The US has both a strategic and a moral stake in defusing the international tobacco time bomb. Soaring rates of tobacco-related disease and death will harm economic, social, and political development in emerging nations. Just as AIDS might destabilize nations, so might tobacco. In turn, that will deter our efforts to bring security to ourselves and democracy to the world.
Continued support of the FCTC will turn science and policy into action and put the US at the forefront of global tobacco control efforts. When we set an example as world leaders of the tobacco control movement, we will be poised to stem the tide of the tobacco pandemic throughout the world. If we act now, we can head off this looming tragedy and eliminate the global scourge of tobacco.
Please visit http://www.fctcnow.org to voice your support of the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control.
CLICK HERE for subscription information about this journal.
