Critics Accuse New Foundation of Acting as Smoke-Screen for Big Tobacco

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Controversy is swirling around the Foundation for a Smoke-Free World. This new non-profit organization has come under intense criticism from health agencies and anti-tobacco campaigners who accuse it of acting as a smoke-screen for Big Tobacco, a charge vigorously denied by the foundation's president. Derek Yach, who created and heads the foundation, was one of the architects of the World Health Organization's Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, which came into force February 27, 2005. He said he believes the provisions of the Convention were still valid and have been largely successful in preventing people from smoking and "in slowing the increase in kids through higher taxes, marketing and so on." But, he told VOA that the Convention focuses little attention on trying to get the billion current smokers in the world to quit the habit. "To actually accelerate the decline in the billion smokers, we need to have better cessation, harm reduction and better product regulation," he said. "And, I think those elements, I do not think have got the energy that we actually require."   Yach said more than seven million people globally die prematurely each year from tobacco. He said his foundation's mission was to wean these smokers away from their deadly addiction by using new harm reduction tools such as e-cigarettes and vaping. "If these products have an impact," he said, "we need to have independent research to show that they should be given more support.
December 17, 2017 at 05:03AM