Despite worldwide concerted efforts by
governments and other Non-State Actors, Nigeria remains amongst the community
of nations that have expressed concerns but done little to tackle or curb the
blooming epidemic of smoking. In Nigeria, the indulgent attitude of individuals
that smoke coupled with their ignorance of the potential dangers has not helped
situation. Most people smoke not knowing the implications of what they are
doing to their health and others around. This is not peculiar to just males,
but females as well.
There was a time when it was a taboo for females to hold
cigarette not to talk of smoking them, but this days its becoming the norm with
female actresses smoking in our home videos thus glamorizing the habit and encouraging
more females to smoke. This is an antisocial act that calls for urgent action
as it negates the efforts of the governments and concerned peoples of Nigeria
to nip smoking in the bud.
Smoking, a habit,
which at one time was considered fashionable and acceptable has been proven
after many years of study to have linkages with many ailments hence it is as
deadly as the scorpion sting. Smoking is a universal problem, which though may
have peculiar geographical approaches in terms of solutions, yet remains one
with the need for a collective global resolve in tackling. To date, no nation
has ever admitted benefiting economically from smoking and we see numerous
efforts made by nations across the globe to deal with this man-made monster.
The United States Centre for Disease
Control and Prevention describes tobacco use as "the single most important
preventable risk to human health in developed countries and an important cause
of premature death worldwide".
For Nigeria, the implication of
unrestricted smoking environment is ominous as tobacco-related ailments take
about 20 years to manifest. Thus the government should anticipate a huge
epidemic of tobacco-related diseases in the coming years. The resultant strain
on public healthcare would be enormous as the majority of these smokers are
poor people who have no means to access treatment themselves. They will depend
on the government to bear the cost. The most effective way to curb this
epidemic is to totally ban it in all states of the federation.
To further reinforce this view, let us
consider the following facts about smoking:
From the GAT Survey, Tobacco Use In 2012
saw 5.6% (4.7 million) Nigerian adults aged 15 years or older use tobacco
products with a breakdown of 10.0% (4.2 million) of men and 1.1% (0.5 million)
of women. Overall, 3.9% (3.1 million) of adults (7.3% of men and 0.4% of women)
currently smoked tobacco, and 3.7% (3.1 million) of adults (7.2% of men and
0.3% of women) currently smoked cigarettes.
2.9% of adults (2.4 million) were daily
smokers (5.6% of men, 0.3% of women) while 0.9% (0.8 million) were occasional
smokers (1.8% of men and 0.1% of women). Daily cigarette smokers smoked an
average of 8 cigarettes per day; 7 cigarettes per day in urban areas and 9
cigarettes per day in rural areas.
More than 60% of 20 to 34 year old males
who had ever smoked on a daily basis started smoking daily before the age of 20
years. More than half of all current daily tobacco users (55.3%) have their
first tobacco use of the day within 30 minutes of waking up. Smokeless tobacco
products were used by 1.9% of adults (1.6 million) (2.9% of men and 0.9% of
women). By region, South East has a higher percentage of smokeless tobacco
users compared to other regions in Nigeria.
The good news is that together we can stop
this epidemic from invading our territory. Join us in making this strong appeal
for the National Assembly to pass comprehensive tobacco control legislation
bill, follow us on twitter, add your voice by visiting our facebook page, like
our post, drop your comments and share widely with others. Together we can make
the change that we all desire.
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