Regional alliance congratulates Thailand on 85% health warnings on cigarette packs

BANGKOK, March 11 (TNA) - The Southeast Asia Tobacco Control Alliance (SEATCA) has congratulated Thailand on the recent signing of a regulation on requiring 85 per cent graphic health warnings (GHW) on cigarette packs sold in Thailand, effective over the next six months. A SEATCA press release said on Monday that Thai Public Health Minister Dr. Pradith Sinthawanarong signed the regulation, on behalf of the Kingdom, on March 8, under which health warning labels on tobacco products sold on the domestic market are to be increased from 55 per cent currently to 85 per cent. The new regulation takes effect within 6 months after it is published in the Royal Gazette, which normally takes one month after the regulation is signed. SEATCA Director Bungon Ritthiphakdee was quoted as saying,"SEATCA is ecstatic and would like to convey our heartiest congratulations to Thailand for its leadership in tobacco control. Its enactment of rules to put in place the largest GHWs on cigarette packs speaks to its political will and example to safeguard the health of its people." Other member countries in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) with the GHW include Brunei, Singapore and Malaysia. Currently, Australia has the largest graphic health warnings in the world at 82.5 per cent, 75 per cent on the front and 90 per cent on the back. Uruguay has the largest at 80 per cent on the front and the back.If such the regulation takes effect in Sri Lanka, the country will have 80 per cent on the front and the back. SEATCA, however, warned that the tobacco industry and its front groups, including tobacco farmers, will likely lobby to fight and block the regulation, citing a case just last month in which the Thai Tobacco Trade Association, allegedly funded by Phillip Morris, a world most established tobacco firm, submitted a letter to the Thai Ministry of Health, opposing the new GHW policy. In the 10-member (ASEAN), the tobacco industry has posed many other challenges, namely its attempts to block laws on 100-percent smoke-free policies in public and work places and to fight product regulations such as those banning the adding of flavourings in tobacco. (Flavourings are insidious as they are added to lure younger people into smoking). (TNA)