International Tobacco Control Policy Evaluation Project

10/25/2024

05/16/2019

We are excited to announce the publication of our 3rd economics supplement in To***co Control. The Supplement highlights ITC Project research on the impact of price & tax changes using rich data on affordability, purchase behaviours, & to***co use across countries & over time: http://to***cocontrol.bmj.com/content/28/Suppl_1 …

Online: ISSN 1468-3318Print: ISSN 0964-4563Copyright © 2018 by the BMJ Publishing Group Ltd. All rights reserved. 京ICP备15042040号-3

05/16/2019

Canada now has the best to***co plain packaging regulations in the world.

The regulations, which apply to all to***co products, include provisions such as:
- Prohibiting brand colours, graphics and logos on packages, and requiring a drab brown colour to appear as the base colour for all brands; brand names can still appear on packages, but in a standard way for all brands
- Banning slim and superslim ci******es, as well as stylish "purse packs" appealing to young women and girls
- Banning ci******es longer than 85 mm, meaning that "glamorous" 100 mm ci******es will be banned
-Requiring cigarette packages to be in a standardized slide and shell format, thus increasing warning size and effectiveness; special package formats will no longer be able to appear
- Requiring the largest health warnings on cigarette packages in the world in terms of surface area
- Prohibiting branding and other promotions on the cigarette itself, and requiring ci******es to have a flat end without holes or recesses

Plain packaging will be implemented November 9, 2019 at the manufacturer level, and February 7, 2020 at the retail level.

More at: https://www.newswire.ca/news-releases/canada-now-has-the-best-to***co-plain-packaging-regulations-in-the-world-821342826.html

11/01/2018

may soon have on individual ci******es.

Canada could soon be the first country to put cancer warnings on individual ci******es.

10/12/2018

New ITC Findings, published in CMAJ Open, provide a baseline for evaluating future trends in smokers' support for innovative measures to radically reduce smoking rates in Canada.

Most Canadian smokers are in favour of novel policies to reduce to***co use, according to a national survey by the International To***co Control Policy Evaluation Project (ITC) at the University of Waterloo. Responding to the Canadian government’s commitment to reduce to***co use to less than five...

10/10/2018

Over the last 10 years, anti-smoking measures such as taxing to***co products and graphic warnings saved an estimated 22 million lives worldwide.

Our own University of Waterloo Faculty of Arts psychology professor, Geoff Fong, leads the International To***co Control Policy Evaluation Project contributing to the success of anti-smoking measures in the past decade.

Learn more: http://ow.ly/vgSa30ma4jM

09/29/2017

Brazilian National Cancer Institute releases ITC Project findings on smoking in Brazil and 27 other countries at the INCA 80 Years Congress

Rio de Janeiro, September 29, 2017: Brazilian smokers are highly motivated to stop smoking and strongly support new governmental actions for smoking cessation, according to the ITC Brazil Project, a survey that measures the psychosocial and behavioral impact of policies for to***co control. The results of the study were announced at the INCA 80 Years Congress. Brazil has the highest percentage (49%) of smokers who plan to quit in the next 6 months in the 25 countries surveyed (in three countries this question was not asked). The percentage is quite high, especially compared to developed countries with structured to***co control programs such as the USA (37%), France (34%), England (33%) and Germany (10%).

The ITC study indicates that smokers and non-smokers support the creation of new government actions to stop smoking. There is strong support even for a total ban on the marketing of to***co products - something that is not on the agenda, but demonstrates the approval of the State's action in the control of smoking. The ITC Project asked all respondents whether they support or oppose a total ban on to***co products over the next 10 years as the government would provide treatment to help smokers quit. The results show that 68% of smokers and 77% of non-smokers surveyed "support" or "strongly support" this prohibition.

Smokers and non-smokers strongly support two key policies to reduce advertising and promotion of to***co products: banning the display of to***co products at points of sale and the standardization of all cigarette packs. Approximately three-quarters of smokers (72%) support the ban on in-store cigarette displays and nearly half (49%) support standardized packaging. Support is even greater among non-smokers: 86 percent support the ban on in-store cigarette displays and 56 percent support standardized packaging.

The full press release and report are available on the ITC Project website at: http://www.itcproject.org/resources/view/2453

This report presents findings from the ITC Brazil Survey. Between 2009 and 2016-17, three survey waves were conducted among a cohort of 1,200 adult smokers and 600 non-smokers in Rio de Janerio, São Paulo, and Porto Alegre.

08/22/2017

Hungary is now officially the 5th Party to implement plain packaging, as an advanced measure under Article 11 of the Convention. From 20 August 2016 all cigarette packages need to carry pictorial health warnings of 65% of the front and back of packages. The Decree 239/2016 (of 16 August 2016) of the...

06/02/2017

Finally! Smoke-free in the Czech Republic. https://uk.news.yahoo.com/czech-republic-enforces-smoking-ban-years-debate-103158827.html

05/31/2017

Death Toll Among Smokers in China Will Surge if Government Doesn't Take Action

The International To***co Control Policy Evaluation Project and the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention surveyed smokers and non-smokers between 2006 and 2015 to measure China’s progress in implementing policies to curb to***co use and to compare the effectiveness of China’s to***co control efforts relative to other ITC countries. The most recent ITC China Survey was conducted from 2013-15 among a total of 8000 smokers and 2000 non-smokers in 5 large cities, including Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou, and 5 rural areas.

The global movement to strengthen laws to reduce to***co use and its devastating impact on public health has gained momentum in recent years. However, China has become the epicenter of the global to***co epidemic with 1 million smoking-related deaths in China each year. There are 316 million smokers in China, including more than half of all adult men. Given that over half of daily smokers will die of smoking-related diseases, that means that over 1 in 4 men in China will die because of smoking, each losing over a decade of life.

In 2005, the Chinese government ratified the World Health Organization (WHO) Framework Convention on To***co Control (FCTC), a global health treaty that now obligates 180 countries to introduce strong measures to reduce to***co use and the harms of secondhand smoke.

ITC-China CDC study findings show that 10 years after ratifying the FCTC, China has made some progress in to***co control, but progress has been slow. Currently, China is not sufficiently addressing its number one preventable cause of death--ci******es,” said Geoffrey Fong, founder of the 28-country ITC Project and professor of psychology at the University of Waterloo. “For 10 years, China has not taken actions to reduce smoking that have been shown to work well in many other countries.”

The ITC-China CDC Report makes 4 recommendations to strengthen China’s to***co control efforts, including pictorial warnings, a comprehensive national smoke-free law, public education campaigns, and increasing cigarette taxes and prices. High levels of public support for the Chinese government to do more to control smoking, including over 75% of smokers and non-smokers themselves, is a compelling call for the swift implementation of these measures.

“Smoking is the most important cause of chronic, non-communicable diseases, which account for nearly 90 per cent of deaths in China,” said Yuan Jiang, the director of the To***co Control Office of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention. “It is critically important for China to implement a national smoke-free law, pictorial health warnings on cigarette packages, and a complete ban on all forms of to***co advertising.”

“It’s now time for policymakers in China to build on the steps it has taken and to move decisively to reverse the to***co epidemic,” said Bernhard Schwartländer, WHO Representative in China. “Findings from the ITC-China CDC Report present a compelling case that more action needs to be taken in China in the interest of public health.”

The ITC-China CDC Wave 1 to 5 Executive Summary Report is available in both English and Chinese at: http://www.itcproject.org/resources/view/2430.

04/27/2017

The Hong Kong government has tabled a law calling for an increase in the size of its graphic health warnings from 50% to 85% of the pack, doubling the number of warnings from 6 to 12, and adding a hotline telephone number for smokers who want to quit.

In 2007, Hong Kong became one of the first jurisdictions in Asia to implement graphic health warnings on to***co packaging occupying 50% of the pack. However, of 12 countries/jurisdictions with graphic health warnings in 2007, Hong Kong is the last to revise them, meaning the same warnings have remained unchanged for a decade.

ITC Project’s Dr. Fong wrote an op-ed published online by South China Morning Post in support of the proposed revisions. Dr. Fong cites the ITC Project’s strong international evidence that suggests the proposed improvements in the warnings will increase noticing, increase thinking about the harms of ci******es, motivate quitting among smokers, reduce the likelihood that youth will take up smoking, and will be a significant policy in the government's objective of tackling the number one preventable cause of death and disease in Hong Kong.

To read the full article, visit: http://www.scmp.com/comment/insight-opinion/article/2090405/hong-kongs-plan-bigger-health-warnings-cigarette-packs.

Geoffrey Fong says studies over the years and in many countries demonstrate the effectiveness of bigger warning labels and a ‘quitline’ in empowering smokers to give up, while motivating youth not to take up the harmful habit

03/22/2017

On March 21, 2017, an article was published in Lancet Public Health on the impact of strong implementation of FCTC policies (the POWER measures) on reductions in smoking prevalence across 126 countries. This result demonstrates the strong potential of the FCTC, particularly the importance of strong implementation, to achieve the ultimate goals of the FCTC.
But the good news is tempered with the disturbing news of the very slow progress of the implementation of the FCTC, specifically within these 5 demand-reduction policy domains where the most attention has been paid, and to an even greater extent to all of the other domains of the FCTC where much less attention has been paid, and consequently for which the gap between obligation and performance is much greater.
Because this study validates the FCTC's potential and promise across nearly two-thirds of the world's population, this study may be useful for efforts to mobilize and strengthen efforts to support stronger and swifter FCTC implementation.

The full article is available at: http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanpub/article/PIIS2468-2667(17)30045-2/fulltext

Implementation of key WHO FCTC demand-reduction measures is significantly associated with lower smoking prevalence, with anticipated future reductions in to***co-related morbidity and mortality. These findings validate the call for strong implementation of the WHO FCTC in the WHO's Global Action Pla...