Leading tobacco companies are working to expand the e-cigarette market in Bangladesh and there is anecdotal evidence that e-cigarette use among youths and children is increasing due to various promotional tactics used by the companies.
The tobacco industry applies the promotional tactics by placing some misleading arguments such as ‘e-cigarette is less harmful product and it could help achieve goal of tobacco-free Bangladesh by 2040’.
Anti-tobacco activists are concerned about the drastic rise of the novel tobacco product in the country and the fraudulent arguments placed by the tobacco industry for promoting e-cigarettes.
However, experts on public health and tobacco control said that e-cigarette is not less harmful, but a very harmful product to health. The World Health Organization (WHO) has also termed the ‘e-cigarette’ as harmful product.
According to statement of WHO issued on December 14, e-cigarettes with nicotine are highly addictive and are harmful. Whilst long-term health effects are not fully understood, it has been established that they generate toxic substances, some of which are known to cause cancer and some that increase the risk of heart and lung disorders.
“Use of e-cigarettes can also affect brain development and lead to learning disorders for young people. Fetal exposure to e-cigarettes can adversely affect the development of the fetus in pregnant women. Exposure to emissions from e-cigarettes also poses risks to bystanders,” says WHO.
As e-cigarettes are very harmful to health, neighbouring India and many other countries banned the novel tobacco product. “Thirty-four countries ban the sale of e-cigarettes,88 countries have no minimum age at which e-cigarettes can be bought and 74 countries have no regulations in place for these harmful products,” says WHO report.
However, the e-cigarette is still not banned in Bangladesh. The ‘Smoking and Using of Tobacco Products (Control) Act’ does not address e-cigarettes. The tobacco industry takes advantage of loopholes in the tobacco control law and began e-cigarette business in Bangladesh through applying various tactics.
Against this backdrop, anti-tobacco activists and organisations have been demanding to ban e-cigarettes in Bangladesh. A total of 22 organisations and research platforms recently made the demand of banning on e-cigarettes in the country in the interest of public health. They argued that the activities of tobacco companies in the production and expansion of e-cigarettes may cause a serious threat to public health.
National Heart Foundation, Bangladesh Anti-Tobacco Alliance (BATA), Bangladesh Network for Tobacco Tax Policy (BNTTP), Inter Press Network-IPN, Tobacco Control and Research Cell (TCRC) of Dhaka International University, Work for a Better Bangladesh (WBB) Trust, ARK Foundation, NATAB and AID Foundation are among the organisations who raised the demand of e-cigarette ban in Bangladesh.
The anti-tobacco activists and organisations said that production, import-export, promotion, marketing and consumption of e-cigarettes must be banned in Bangladesh as soon as possible by amending the ‘Smoking and Tobacco Products Usage (Control) (Amendment) Act, 2013’.
“If e-cigarette is not reined in now, it will be difficult to minimize overall health harms to population. Immediate step is needed to ban the e-cigarette in Bangladesh,” said Syed Mahbubul Alam Tahin, a public health lawyer who has been working on policy advocacy issues for about decades.
Talking to Bangladesh Post on Friday (December 22), the renowned anti-tobacco advocate in Bangladesh said that the government should take decisive steps to prevent the young generation, children and new users from becoming addicted to e-cigarette in order to protect the public health and wellbeing of Bangladesh.
The tobacco industry has targeted Bangladesh as a market for e-cigarette with a particular focus on making the newer nicotine product attractive to young consumers. It can be inferred from the WHO statement that the trend of expanding the e-cigarette market by targeting youths and children is going on in some other countries in the world.
In such a situation, the World Health Organization in its statement said that urgent action is needed to protect children and prevent the uptake of e-cigarettes. “E-cigarettes as consumer products are not shown to be effective for quitting tobacco use at the population level. Instead, alarming evidence has emerged on adverse population health effects” says WHO.
Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General, said, “Kids are being recruited and trapped at an early age to use e-cigarettes and may get hooked to nicotine.”
He called upon countries to implement strict measures to prevent uptake to protect their citizens, especially their children and young people.
“E-cigarettes target children through social media and influencers, with at least 16000 flavours. Some of these products use cartoon characters and have sleek designs, which appeal to the younger generation. There is an alarming increase in the use of e-cigarettes among children and young people with rates exceeding adult use in many countries,” Dr Ruediger Krech, WHO Director for Health Promotion.
According to the WHO statement, children 13–15-years old are using e-cigarettes at rates higher than adults in all WHO regions. Studies consistently show that young people that use e-cigarettes are almost three times more likely to use cigarettes later in life.
Urgent measures are necessary to prevent uptake of e-cigarettes and counter nicotine addiction alongside a comprehensive approach to tobacco control, and in light of national circumstances, says WHO.
The tobacco industry profits from destroying health and is using the newer products to get a seat at the policy-making table with governments to lobby against health policies. The tobacco industry funds and promotes false evidence to argue that these products reduce harm, while at the same time heavily promoting these products to children and non-smokers and continuing to sell billions of cigarettes.
Strong decisive action is needed to prevent the uptake of e-cigarettes based on the growing body of evidence of its use by children and adolescents and health harms, says WHO.
Meanwhile, the tobacco industry targets Bangladesh for e-cigarette expansion as the country is one of the highest population densities, and the youths are the largest population group in the country.
Syed Saiful Alam Shovan, an anti-tobacco researcher who was involved in a recent study on e-cigarette expansion in Bangladesh, told the Bangladesh Post that the e-cigarette use among the youths and children in Bangladesh is rapidly increasing. A few years ago, youths from wealthy families used e-cigarettes, but now young people and school children from lower-income families also use e-cigarettes. The e-cigarette product is now available in common supermarkets and even on the shops on the sidewalks and shops in all parts of Dhaka city and other parts of the country, he added.
Some doctors and public health experts in Bangladesh said that the tobacco companies are putting the country’s public health at serious risk through spreading the new tobacco product in Bangladesh in different ways.
Professor Dr. Arup Ratan Chowdhury. founding president of MANAS, said that despite the government’s goal of building a tobacco-free Bangladesh, cigarette companies are spreading e-cigarette in Bangladesh putting the country’s public health at serious risk.
Professor Dr Golam Mohiuddin Faruque, president of Bangladesh Cancer Society, said that the tobacco companies are attracting young people and smokers to e-cigarettes by using less harmful terms. “E-cigarette is not less harmful, but a very harmful product,” he said.
Professor Dr Sohel Reza Choudhury, head of Department of Epidemiology & Research of National Heart Foundation, echoed the same. He said that if e-cigarette is not reined in now, it will not be possible to control it later.