Promoting the Ugly Truth of Smoking

http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2014/01/22/your-letters-the-ugly-truth-smoking.html

As heavy rain kept pattering on my windowpane this morning, my drowsiness jolted out of my body when news coverage on how Australia’s plain packaging policy has worked well to deter its citizen, particularly teenagers from smoking.

Euwwww... I gave a snort of disgust at the graphic images of mouth ulcers, cancerous lungs and gangrenous limbs on the plain packaging of tobacco products. Oh yeah... Definitely such gruesome packaging would send an immediate psychological leap of disgusting taste. I would have ran off in terror!

The ugly truth of smoking looks real and haunting in real pictures!

A recent survey by British Heart Foundation showed that cigarette packets featuring health warnings deter a third of British teenagers from smoking, and nearly eight in ten young people or 77% think the UK should introduce standardized cigarette packs like those used in Australia.

Then, a question leaped out of my brain: Will such policy applicable to Indonesia where smoking kills at least 225,000 people annually? Not to mention that Indonesia is the only WHO member state in Asia that has not yet ratified the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control?

A study on Indonesia as one of the major cigarette smoking countries in 2008 also revealed that healthcare costs attributed to tobacco-related illnesses amount to 11 trillion IDR each year (1.2 billion US) and in 2005, households with smokers spent 11.5% of their income on tobacco products compared to 11% spent on fish, meat, eggs and milk combined, 3.2% on education and 2.3% on health.

This is grossly maddening on how people choose cigarette over basic needs such as education and health which play significant role to the betterment of their future life.

Despite these staggering facts, the government seems halfheartedly to take bolder measures to discourage its citizens from smoking. The classic argument centers always on the argument that tobacco industries have the trickle down effect  on tax and job. This nation has become addicted to the revenues produced by taxed placed upon tobacco products and the mass employment offered by the industries. It weighs only the benefits of economic health in the short run, but ignore the financial loss and health cost caused by the industries over the the nation in the long run.

For this reason, tax on tobacco in Indonesia is stil relatively  low compared to other countries in the region and falls below the World Bank’s recommendation that taxes make up two-thirds to four-fifths of retail price. Consequently, tobacco products’ price is inexpensive and affordable to attract more people to initially take up the habit and ensure the return business of addicted patrons.

My regular minivan driver constantly stopped at the traffic light to buy one cigarette for Rp. 1,000,- , smoking along the way and choking my breath at the back seats.

There’s no such smoke-free environment as well because people have always reluctant to obey the laws, knowing they would walk free easily. People can find cigarette almost in every nook and cranny of the city and puff as they please in anywhere they please. Oh, what a sweet heaven for smokers!

To make matter it worse, misleading tobacco advertising, promotion and sponsorship is generally allowed in Indonesia, with only a few restrictions. It generates another tax income for the government! It strengthens the glitz and glitter of tobacco products.

Spectacular and glamorous musical concerts all over Indonesia are generally sponsored by big glitzy tobacco industries that feed the public with an image of glamour and classy if you puff. Elite prestigious sports often get similar sponsor that unconsciously send a message that smoking and extreme athleticism go hand in hand. Cigarette ads on TV and public spaces also implicitly say that you’re successful and sexy if you have a cigarette at hand.

These ads stand tall and proud,  smiling like a siren and say “Join the Club guys! It’s smoking sexy, hot, fun and classy!” And who will not fall for such alluring and beguiling sweet persuasion.

As to the required warning labels (that is supposedly to discourage people from smoking) on all smokeable tobacco product packages, the warning of “smoking can cause cancer, heart attacks, impotence, and disturbances to pregnancy and fetal development”,  is put always on the back of the package with tiny letters. It is barely noticeable and mostly will be ignored entirely, drown in the sparkling gold or silver packet that catch and please the eye.

It just doesn’t work!

Considering all these unhappy facts, I personally believe that adopting the standardized plain packaging policy featuring graphic images or warnings of the health-risk posed by smoking will  deter people particularly teenagers from smoking. Smokers are more likely to consider giving up seeing such horrifying images, thinking that the taste would go hand in hand with the ugly pictures.

Further, the images will help to break the cycle of misleading iconic cigarette ads, giving it a brand new stamp to smoking as less stylish and sociable, degrading and not as attractive and cool to mimic. Young people will feel discouraged looking at the plain cigarette packs, thus cutting off the chain of “replacement” smokers progressively.

Bring on the ugly truth of smoking in real and I believe such measure will have a dramatic effect. It takes guts to impose such harsher requirement for cigarette packaging. It takes a bold government to initiate such a change.

The question remains: Does the government have what it takes to implement such policy as in increasing the tobacco tax up to standard? It means waging a war with gigantic tobacco industries that have wrapped this nation with their ugly, hideous tentacles!