Public Health on Top

Tobacco companies are having busy days ahead of the national budget, spreading their usual propaganda narratives on how increase in tobacco prices will increase illicit tobacco trade, decrease govt. revenues and make “millions” of bidi workers jobless. A new talking point, however, adds to the crowd this year. A laboratory analysis of tobacco products available in Bangladeshi market reveals the presence of harmful lead, cadmium and chromium. The report has managed to earn significant media attention. To conduct tests on an otherwise widely-accepted scientific truth and to highly publicize the findings is unnatural and unnecessary. Tobacco products and tobacco smoke contain more than 7,000 harmful chemicals. Considering the detrimental effect of tobacco, the World Health Organization (WHO) has adopted an international treaty, the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) to protect public health from tobacco. In 2012, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) of the USA published a list of 93 elements in tobacco (which includes lead, cadmium and chromium) that are responsible for cancer, heart diseases and other fatal diseases. So, tobacco means poison, be it local or foreign.
Tobacco companies often use such tactics to extract additional facilities. In 2015, a study report was published in Malaysia that claimed that cigarettes entering the country in illicit ways contain more tar and nicotine that locally-produced ones. Similar findings in the UK also claimed that illicit cigarettes contain more carcinogens. So, it should be investigated whether tobacco companies have any involvement behind such highly publicized research findings in Bangladesh. Spreading confusion in such manner often gives tobacco companies opportunity to fish in muddy water. They get to hold discussions with the policymakers, to interfere in the formulation and implementation of tobacco control related policies. Tobacco companies in Bangladesh have been trying to market electronic cigarettes, vaping and heated tobacco products (HTPs) as ‘safe’ alternative to traditional tobacco products, although those products have been scientifically proven as harmful. Claiming that traditional and locally-produced tobacco products do more harm, tobacco companies can confuse and influence the Bangladeshi policymakers with a view to extracting legal and tax facilities to import, produce and market new generation tobacco products. Bangladesh, where 49 percent of population are youth, has emerged as a tempting market for tobacco companies. Relevant authorities and stakeholders should stay vigilant so that tobacco companies cannot get such large population of youth hooked on tobacco. Strict implementation of tobacco control law needs to be ensured to foster the transformation of the country toward a tobacco-free one by 2040.