Author: Simon Chapman AO This blog post originally appeared on Doctor Portal and is published here with permission. ON 14 August, 2017, The Australian newspaper ran a story guaranteed to go viral. The headline screamed: “More smokers lighting up, despite the costs”. The journalist, Adam Creighton, who has, grotesquely, written about tobacco control being like […]
Category: Taxation
A missed opportunity: The US Helsinki Commission hearing on the illicit tobacco trade in the OSCE region
Benoît Gomis, Kelley Lee, Ross MacKenzie benoitg@sfu.ca On 19 July 2017, the US Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE) – also known as the ‘Helsinki Commission’ – held a hearing on the illicit tobacco trade in the Organization for Security Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) region. The Helsinki Commission, an independent US government […]
France: breaking new ground in tobacco control
The start of 2017 has seen tobacco control in France boosted with a series of ground-breaking tobacco control measures, as detailed in a recent article by Physicians for a Smoke-Free Canada. After a phase-in period, cigarette plain packaging is fully in force as of 1 January 2017. As in other countries that have already introduced plain […]
Industry-funded International Tax and Investment Center responds to criticism by attempting to muddy the waters
Karen A Evans-Reeves, Anna B Gilmore and Andy Rowell Tobacco Control Research Group, University of Bath, The tobacco industry is under attack. In just two weeks, in May 2016, its tactic of challenging any law that threatens its profits, took a big hit. The arbitration panel, that tobacco giant Philip Morris International (PMI) had hoped […]
Southeast Asia: new tobacco tax index
The world’s first tobacco taxation index by a civil society organisation has been published by the Southeast Asia Tobacco Control Alliance (SEATCA). The report monitors implementation of the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) Article 6 guidelines on price and tax measures. Southeast Asia is home to approximately 10% of the world’s 1 billion smokers and […]
Indonesia: court upholds tobacco tax to fund health
Abdillah Ahsan Faculty of Economics, University of Indonesia Good news on tobacco control from Indonesia is rare. Recently, however there was a victory in the area of tobacco tax. On 1 January 2014, Law No. 28 of 2009 on regional taxes was introduced, which allows local provinces in Indonesia to charge a local tax to […]
World No Tobacco Day – Special Isssue
To mark World No Tobacco Day 2014, the BMJ has published a special online issue of Tobacco Control with the theme taxes, prices and illicit trade. The issue includes several open access research papers and editorials. The complete table of contents can be found here. We’d also like to take this opportunity to congratulate our […]
Tobacco industry-commissioned report: large decline in EU consumption, almost no change in illegal trade
Konstantin Krasovsky Alcohol and Drug Information Center (ADIC-Ukraine), Kiev, Ukraine krasovskyk@gmail.com On April 17, 2013 Philip Morris International (PMI) issued a press release, based on an annual study conducted by KPMG. PMI claimed the most significant finding of the study is that: “For the sixth year in a row, the illegal trade of cigarettes in […]