Taseer Ahmed
You are en route to your destination when you hit a junction leading to two pathways; one leads to a dead end which, you already know from your previous experience, will bring you to a blind alley – while the other one is a newly-constructed alternate route that can lead to your destination. Which path are you taking?
The sane answer is obviously, the alternate route. Then why are Pakistan’s efforts for a smokeless world hitting the dead end over and over again? Mass anti-smoking awareness campaigns, increased excise tax on cigarettes, and ban on smoking in public places can only do so much. The looming detrimental risks to the health of 23.9 million adult smokers demand for a more rigorous and immediate action that can catalyze the impact of tobacco control efforts and can expedite the journey to an improved public health.
For this, however, it is first important to explore the alternate route and see what the evidence says about it. A leading example is that of Japan, which has been reporting a significant drop in its smoking prevalence rate with the current male smoking rate dropping below 30 percent for the first time ever. While this is mainly owed to the growing awareness of the effects of smoking on health, smoke-free alternatives and reduced-risk products are also among the key drivers of this downward trend. Following the sales uptake of smoking alternatives in the Japanese market in 2016, a corresponding decline was reported in the sale of cigarettes with a consequent decline in the rate of smoking among the population.
The UK serves as another testament to the impact of alternate products on public health as following the adoption of a harm reduction strategy and introduction of smoke-free alternatives as a reduced-risk product, the smoking rate came down to 14.1 percent from 30 percent within 30 years. This achievement has been brought about by collective efforts of experts and regulators who – after hitting a dead end, that is, after seeing no considerable improvement in tobacco control through traditional efforts – experimented with innovative solutions to deter people from smoking. Upon finding tobacco harm reduction as a suitable strategy for its goals and after persevering for decades, the UK has now successfully emerged as a champion with one of the lowest smoking prevalence rates in Europe today.
On the other hand, a 2018 study by the Alternative Research Initiative (ARI) shows the extreme lack of data and knowledge of reduced-risk products and smoke-free alternatives in the country. As a result of this lack of information, the study claims that a lot of misinformation has spread among the stakeholders about these alternate products, which has led to the shutting down of a possibly-effective approach even before trying it out.
A strong public health is a foundation of a strong nation which cannot be compromised on any ground. Therefore, in a situation where our smokers are continuously bouncing off of the dead end for decades, now is the time to consider rerouting and taking the alternate route. This will not only aid smokers who want to quit, but will also assist adult smokers, who would otherwise continue to smoke, to switch to less harmful products and reduce the harm to their body by 95 percent, as suggested by the Public Health England (PHE) study.