Speaking at the opening of the Conference, Mr. Ho Hong Hai, Deputy Director of the Department of Legal Affairs, Ministry of Information and Communications, said that according to the Tobacco Harm Prevention Fund, smoking is the cause of 8 million deaths each year in the world (of which about 1 million deaths are due to passive smoking).
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), the global economic loss caused by tobacco is 1,400 billion USD each year. Tobacco is also the cause of deforestation and environmental pollution.
Every year, about 5% of the forest area is destroyed to grow tobacco, as well as to get wood to dry tobacco. It is estimated that every year, 18 billion trees are needed to make firewood to dry tobacco. The use of tobacco releases into the environment each year about 3,000 to 6,000 tons of formaldehyde, 12,000 to 47,000 tons of nicotine and 300 to 600 million kg of toxic waste from cigarette butts.
Also according to statistics from the Tobacco Harm Prevention Fund, for students aged 13-15, the rate of tobacco use decreased from 3.5% in 2014 to 2.7% in 2022, of which males decreased from 6.3% to 4%, females increased slightly from 0.1% in 2015 to 0.2% in 2020. The rate of passive exposure to tobacco smoke (passive smoking) in public places also decreased, such as: At the workplace decreased from 42.6% to 30.9%; at home decreased from 59.9% to 56%; at restaurants decreased from 80.7% to 78.1%; at bars/coffee/tea shops decreased from 89.1% to 86.2%.
According to Mr. Ho Hong Hai, the number of people using tobacco has not increased, but access to and use of new tobacco products such as electronic cigarettes and heated tobacco products, especially among young people, is increasing. He hopes that reporters and editors attending the conference will strengthen communication work on preventing and combating the harmful effects of tobacco in the coming time.
Providing information on activities and some priority issues in tobacco harm prevention and control in Vietnam, Ms. Nguyen Thi Thu Huong, Tobacco Harm Prevention Fund, Ministry of Health said: Currently, all countries in the world, including Vietnam, have used effective tobacco harm prevention and control policies and measures initiated by WHO. These are: Monitoring tobacco use and implementing tobacco harm prevention policies; protecting people from exposure to secondhand smoke; supporting smoking cessation; warning about tobacco harms; strictly enforcing regulations prohibiting tobacco advertising, promotion and sponsorship; and increasing tobacco taxes.
According to WHO, Vietnam has prevented 280,000 premature deaths due to diseases related to tobacco use. The estimated cost savings due to the reduction in the rate of diseases caused by tobacco use in the period 2015-2020 is 1,277 billion VND/year. However, Vietnam is still one of the 15 countries with the highest number of adult male smokers in the world.
Ms. Nguyen Thi Thu Huong believes that one of the main reasons for the high and slow decline in smoking rates is that Vietnam’s tobacco tax is still very low. Cheap tobacco prices increase the ability of young people and the poor to access and buy tobacco. In addition, new products have appeared on the market: electronic cigarettes, heated tobacco, etc.
To solve the difficulties in communicating about tobacco harm prevention, Ms. Nguyen Thi Thu Huong hopes that press and media agencies will increase communication about the implementation of the Law on Tobacco Harm Prevention, and continue to communicate to raise awareness about the harm of tobacco products, especially new tobacco products.
At the conference, Dr. Nguyen Trung Nguyen - Director of the Poison Control Center of Bach Mai Hospital assessed that e-cigarettes are completely harmful to health; they initiate a trend of abuse, addiction, and uncontrollable exposure to synthetic chemicals, causing a series of new diseases; worsening the problem of traditional cigarettes; and complicating and worsening the drug problem. Therefore, he proposed that the circulation of e-cigarettes in Vietnam should be banned immediately, completely, without testing, without evaluation, or monitoring.
Also at the conference, the Organizing Committee provided reporters and editors with information on some misconceptions, facts, and international experiences in controlling new tobacco products; challenges in preventing and combating the harmful effects of tobacco due to the tobacco industry's intervention in global tobacco control; and WHO's recommendations on the viewpoint of banning new tobacco products.
With the above contents, the Organizing Committee hopes to provide reporters and editors with new information on tobacco harm prevention, especially new generation tobacco products; enhance coordination and information sharing between agencies and organizations implementing tobacco harm prevention and control and press agencies; thereby increasingly improving the effectiveness of legal communication on tobacco harm prevention and control.
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