Southeast Asia needs to step up tobacco control: WHO

Although tobacco consumption has declined by nearly 30% in Southeast Asia since 2000, the region remains the world's highest tobacco consumer. The World Health Organization (WHO) provides an overview of the region's situation and calls on countries to do more to reduce the consumption of tobacco and nicotine products.

In a press release, the World Health Organization (WHO) regional agency for Southeast Asia estimates that this phenomenon currently affects 411 million people.[1]. For 280 million of them, it is mainly oral tobacco products. 77 % of the global consumption of these products is made in these countries.

Significant progress in some countries on tobacco consumption

Smoking prevalence has thus fallen from 68.9 % in 2000 to 43.7 % in 2022 for men, and from 33.5 % in 2000 to 9.4 % in 2022 for women. By continuing on this path, Southeast Asia should achieve its goal of reducing non-communicable diseases by 30 % by 2030, particularly in India and Nepal. While a "tobacco-free Bangladesh" is planned for 2040, the project of quitting smoking is hoped for in India as early as 2030, as part of the sustainable development agenda.

E-cigarettes booming despite some total bans

According to Saima Wazed, WHO Regional Director for South-East Asia, "Urgent measures are also needed to regulate electronic cigarettes, whose effectiveness in smoking cessation has not been demonstrated". The proliferation of e-cigarette use is visible in Southeast Asia, but scientific data is still lacking to establish this. Not all countries take into account the prevalence of vaping in their studies and data on this subject remains patchy.[2].

Among the 34 countries in the world that have banned e-cigarettes, several of them are located in Southeast Asia (India, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Thailand, North Korea, Timor-Leste). However, this does not prevent the increase in the prevalence of use of these products, whether in isolation or combined with smoked cigarettes. In Thailand, the prevalence of vaping among 13-15 year-olds has increased from 3.5 % in 2015 to 17.6 % in 2022.

Efforts to be strengthened, according to the WHO

Most countries in this region have implemented a demand reduction strategy with reference to the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC), which includes important provisions of the programme MPOWER. THE interference level However, given the high level of tobacco industry spending, the WHO regional office urges all countries in the region to continue to adopt voluntary and binding measures to reduce smoking and vaping. Only such measures would significantly reduce the incidence of cancer, cardiovascular disease and respiratory diseases attributable to tobacco products.

Keywords: World Health Organization, Southeast Asia, oral tobacco products, e-cigarettes, MPOWER

©Tobacco Free Generation

M.F.

[1] Accelerate tobacco and e-cigarette control measures: WHO, WHO South-East Asia Region, press release, published on 20 February 2024, accessed the same day.

[2] WHO global report on trends in prevalence of tobacco use 2000–2030. WHO, report, January 2024, 144 p.