AMMAN — The
World Health Organization’s (WHO) call to increase the price of tobacco in the hope of reducing the number
of smokers has given way to polemic in a country where smoking is widespread.
اضافة اعلان
While some assert that raising tobacco prices is
bound to reduce the number of smokers, others say that smokers will not be
deterred from buying, but rather resort to smugglers.
A few days ago, the coordinator of non-communicable
diseases at the WHO office in Amman, Hala Bu Kardana, called for raising the
prices of tobacco products during a session on the role of the media in
promoting and reducing tobacco use.
The average per capita spending in Jordan on
manufactured cigarettes is about JD60.3 per month, and this does not include
the expenses on shisha and vaping products, according to statements by the
Ministry of Health.
Minister of Health
Firas Al-Hawri said that smoking feeds the state JD900 million annually, but
the cost of treating patients due to smoking is JD1.6 billion per year, a loss
estimated at JD700 million, according to Khaberni.
Jordan is considered one of the top three countries
in the world in smoking, despite having signed the WHO Framework Convention on
Tobacco Control in 2004, and the issuance of Public Health Law No. 47 of 2008
and its amendments, as a legislative response to the Framework Convention on
Tobacco Control.
MP Farid Haddad told
Jordan News that it
should be a government priority “to reduce smoking by working to promote a
culture of anti-smoking, like other countries in the world, and applying global
rules to smokers”.
According to him raising prices of tobacco products will
not limit or reduce the number of smokers.
And while higher prices will not be “a deterrent for
smokers”, he believes that “we will notice increased smuggling of tobacco with
toxic components, which will constitute a bigger danger to health”.
“If the price of tobacco is raised, smokers will
certainly not leave this habit, but will go to lesser quality products,” he
stressed.
But while he said that “the government should not
increase the burden on citizens who resort to smoking under difficult circumstances”,
he also stressed that the cost of treating patients with health problems caused
by smoking is very high, and “the government should take measures to deal with
smokers”.
Economist
Wajdi Makhamreh told
Jordan News that Jordan is “one of the top countries that consumes tobacco, globally, and
the government’s policy of raising tobacco prices to limit this phenomenon
might be a good thing”.
At the same time, he said, “the government may
achieve additional revenues that could be invested in projects that benefit the
society, such as supporting the poor, and the Development and Employment Fund”.
Raed Al-Ajouri, owner of a tobacco shop, told
Jordan
News that every time the government raises the prices of cigarettes,
“consumers start changing the type of tobacco they use to ones with lower
prices, or they buy from smugglers”.
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