Burning issue

Now, now. I don’t want to throw more fuel to fire but it remains a fact on how bad smoking is. This news is eye-catching where it says that 400,000 have quit smoking since a ban on lighting up in public places in England started exactly a year ago today. What a way to celebrate a one-year anniversary?

If I may quote from the published study:

Researchers say 40,000 deaths will be prevented over the next decade as a result of the ban. The Smoking Toolkit Study involved interviews with more than 32,000 smokers and ex-smokers over the nine months before the ban and the nine months afterwards.

Smoking was made an offence in all enclosed public spaces in England, including pubs and restaurants, on July 1, 2007, forcing smokers to take their cigarettes outside.

In the nine months preceding the ban, there was a 1.6 percent fall in the prevalence of smoking in England, but in the nine months after its implementation, the fall was 5.5 percent which researchers said equates to 400,000 people

The Brunei Times newspaper today reported that importers of tobacco products have seen sales fall 30 percent since the Government implemented the law, banning smoking in public places and the number of retailers opting to sell cigarettes have also gone down by 20 per cent. Tobacco importers and retailers are required to apply for a licence to import or trade tobacco products. Hopefully smuggling in of tobacco products would not increase as a result.

This is a post I put up earlier on the immediate effect on the smoking ban in Brunei and another post on the same subject of smoking. I wonder if the Ministry of Health do carry out some kind of research or survey to prove that the Tobacco Order is working. The above research is useful, though it maybe too late to do a research before but we can still monitor the after-effect.