TORONTO – The provincial government must put in place stiffer penalties for the illegal manufacturing of contraband cigarettes and help implement a national program to help smokers quit if it wants to curb rising rates of tobacco use, according to a report Tuesday by the Ontario Medical Association.
"The battle against tobacco is far from over," said Dr. Suzanne Stratsberg, president of the OMA at a news conference. "It is clear that we are going to have to redouble our efforts if we are going to have any chance at winning this fight."
The report – titled Tobacco, Illness, and the Physician’s Perspective – and published in this month’s Ontario Medical Review, says smoking costs Ontario’s health-care system $1.6 billion a year.
It also accounts for 85 per cent of lung cancers and 30 per cent of cancer deaths. Every year, 13,000 people in Ontario alone die from smoking-related causes. Smoking is also a contributing factor in 80 to 90 per cent of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.
According to the report, there are 2.3 million smokers in Ontario, up from 2.1 million smokers in the mid-1960s.
Despite the fact that smoking rates have dropped, with only 20 per cent of residents in the province identifying themselves as smokers -down from 50 per cent 50 years ago – it is still an "ongoing health crisis" that governments need to pay attention to, the OMA says.
"The No. 1 thing is that we have got to do something about contraband cigarettes," said Dr. Ted Broadway, former executive director of health policy at the OMA. "If we don’t, we’re just flailing in the wind."
No national statistics were available, but the OMA said they were expected to be similar to the Ontario data.
The report also found that one in five cigarettes smoked in Ontario last year were contraband. Broadway said the availability of cheap cigarettes is also contributing to high rates of tobacco use among youth.
It also called for more awareness campaigns for smoking cessation programs, including funding for counselling and nicotine-based medication. The association also said that smokers who want to kick their addiction do not realize that it may take up to five attempts before they find success.
Other proposals in the report call for reducing the number of locations that sell tobacco products. Currently, a consumer can purchase cigarettes at approximately 16,000 locations in the province. It also recommends placing a moratorium on emerging new smoking products, particularly flavoured cigarillos that target youth.
"The tobacco industry has always focused on children, always knew that they had to get students to initiate," said Broadway. "If I can get you to be 25 without smoking, you’re not going to smoke. If I can get you when you’re 14, I’m going to have you forever."
The report will be presented to the Ontario government.
Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty said Tuesday he looks forward to hearing the recommendations.
"There is supply and there is demand," he said. "We must do as much as we can to prevent our kids from taking up smoking and we got to choke off that demand. That’s the important thing."Ê
McGuinty said the government has made a number of inroads to curb smoking rates in the past, including limiting smoking in public places. "I think we have come a long way in terms of the progress that we have made," he said. "We have in fact, reduced the number of places where you can buy your cigarettes and we have also made them less prominent, in terms of advertising, that appears in convenience stores for example, and I think we have made some real progress there."
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