Public Health on Top

The death-marketer BATB receives award from the ICMAB. The award has been conferred for good governance, accountability and creating transparent corporate culture in production sector. In December, 2014, BATB received ICSB Gold Medal over the same issue. Good governance in producing and marketing such a lethal product like tobacco and establishing accountability and transparency is truly hilarious. Simultaneously, offering award to the death-promoter by a state-body raises doubt over the entire tobacco control activities of the government. Penetrating inside of the government mechanism, the tobacco company obtains the scopes to hamper the anti-tobacco acts formulation process. It is reported that recently the tobacco companies (in guise of Printing Press Owners’ Association) have become successful to extend the deadline of printing pictorial warning on tobacco packets from nine months to 10 months after a meeting over anti- tobacco Rules finalisation issue with the Health Ministry. Now it is time to see if the other sections of the Rules uphold the tobacco company interests. However, we hope that the Rules will be published in a gazette soon without any further interference from the tobacco companies. By the same way, the issue of preventing tobacco companies’ aggression in tobacco farming should also be prioritised and all of us should work hand in hand for formulating an effective tobacco control policy to control tobacco farming in the country as the overall tobacco control activities are will remain unsuccessful until the supply side of tobacco is not controlled.