Govt must stand firm on smoking ban

LOVE it or hate it, the smoking ban imposed on all eateries nationwide on Jan 1 has drawn intense, divergent responses from all corners.

The ban is the 24th no-smoke zone gazetted under the Control of Tobacco Product (Amendment) Regulations 2017.

While non-smokers rejoice, most smokers are resigned to it.

However, there are some who claim that it is against smokers’ rights and have filed for a judicial review to challenge the ban.

It kicked off on Tuesday to much fanfare and media coverage.

There is compliance and noncompliance, as notably shown by two cases.

The image of a lone elderly man sipping his tea with a cigarette in hand while seated away from a shop went viral on social media.

In Shah Alam, a mamak restaurant waiter was slapped and scold- ed after he told some customers to stub out.

Unpopular policies, no matter how well-intentioned, are never easy to implement. The effort by the Health Ministry has been both commended and condemned.

Coffee shop operators, in particular, have bemoaned that the ban will greatly affect business.

Health Minister Datuk Seri Dr Dzulkefly Ahmad must have felt the heat. Three days after the new ruling came into force, he posted on his Facebook page a report by Astro Awani in which he makes a rather incongruous statement – that he will consider the suggestion for an allocation of a smoking corner after the initial six-month period.

Food outlet owners are given six months to adhere to the smoking ban and punitive action will be taken only after the “enforcement education” period.

Resistance or no, the government must be resolute in its stance if it wants to achieve the National Strategic Plan to make Malaysia smoke-free by 2045.

And it must continue to educate the people and increase psychological support for Malaysians in coping with life stresses or quitting smoking while ensuring that enforcement is carried out properly and consistently.

Let us be reminded of the reason for the total smoking ban in eateries.

Article 8 of the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control’s Guidelines says that only a 100% smoke-free environment can effectively protect persons from exposure to tobacco smoke, create a healthy environment for smokers to quit and discourage youth from smoking.

The most comprehensive and rigorous evidence review provided by the International Agency for Research on Cancer in 2009 shows that smoke-free legislation implementation led to a decline in heart disease morbidity.

There is sufficient evidence showing that smoke-free policies do not cause a decline in the business activities of the restaurant and bar industry, and that smoke-free home policies reduce exposure to children of second-hand smoke, and adult and youth smoking, it says.

As for smokers’ claims of rights to light up, the new ruling does not bar them from smoking altogether, hence they can still smoke but at a distance of at least 3m from patrons eating in open-air areas.

Also, consider these figures. According to tobaccoatlas.org, more than 27,200 Malaysians are killed by tobacco-caused diseases every year.

The atlas shows that it costs Malaysia RM15.79bil last year on healthcare expenditures and lost productivity due to early mortality and morbidity.

If smokers claim that they have the right to smoke, can taxpayers argue that they have the right to deny their funds from being used to treat smokers’ self-inflicted illnesses and divert them to other suffering patients?

This would be hard to do, hence prevention is best.

The prevalence of smoking in Malaysia is still high – between 21% and 23% of the population in the last 30 years.

The ministry should not backpedal on its decision for a 100% smoking ban in eateries and let up on its enforcement efforts.

Meanwhile, illicit tobacco products flooding the market that smokers have easy access to need to be addressed urgently.