WHO urges Asia-Pacific to intensify anti-smoking campaigns

May 26, 2011, 9:42 GMT

Manila - The World Health Organization (WHO) Thursday called on Asia-Pacific governments to pass and enforce tougher laws against smoking to prevent premature deaths.

In a message ahead of World No Tobacco Day on Tuesday, WHO regional director Shin Young-soo urged authorities to impose laws that would ban indoor smoking and the sale of tobacco to minors.

Shin said governments should require the use of graphic health warnings on tobacco products and impose higher taxes to keep prices up in hopes of discouraging people from buying cigarettes.

'These are simple policy measures that will save lives and will also result in billions of dollars saved by preventing diseases, productivity losses and death from tobacco use,' he said.

According to the WHO, tobacco kills nearly 6 million people around the world every year, including more than 600,000 non-smokers exposed to secondhand smoke.

Tobacco-related deaths account for 63 per cent of deaths from non-communicable diseases in the world today, it said.

In the Western Pacific region, Shin said about 900 million people are at high risk for tobacco-related diseases.

'This has a significant impact not only on health but also on the economy of countries,' he said. 'The socioeconomic cost of tobacco use to countries is a reason for alarm.'

In Australia, the annual socioeconomic cost of tobacco use was estimated at 33 billion dollars in 2004 to 2005 and in South Korea at 6.1 billion dollars in 2007, the WHO said.

About 1 million deaths per year are attributable to tobacco use in China, it said.