Tobacco as a Health Issue Essay

There exists a considerably complex relationship between environmental issues and health risks. According to a report by the World Health Organization (2012), tobacco is among the leading cause of death and disability across the globe. The report further indicates that an estimated 6 million people have been killed worldwide from tobacco consumptions, from which more than 600,000 were non-smokers who died from inhaling environmental tobacco smoke. Taking into consideration such a significant statistics, it is apparent that tobacco and its consumption is a major public health issue and deserves a considerable attention. As the purpose of the essay, the paper identifies and discusses tobacco use as a public health issue and explores the holistic impact of smoking on an individual's wellbeing.

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Tobacco as a public health issue affects the general population, starting from the smoker, to the inhaler of the environmental tobacco smoke, and to the families of both the victims, hence the rationale for the choice of the topic. The deaths, disease, and disability from tobacco and its consumption not only cause great suffering to the victims and their families but also cause major losses to the economy. With reports indicating that the life of a smoker is shortened by 10 years on average, the result is a premature loss of an economically active citizen (Jha et al., 2013). According to WHO, tobacco consumption is a major global problem with approximately 1 billion male and 250 million female smokers existing worldwide. There are a further estimated 99,000 young smokers, most of which are children under the age of 10 and are from low-income and middle-income societies.

Tobacco use is known to be health hazardous as the smoke contains harmful nicotine, the poisonous alkaloid, among other harmful substances (Curry et al., 2008). As a proven public health issue, the control of tobacco and its consumption is mandatory to every to every society. The key elements of a comprehensive tobacco control policy and which would quantify the scale of the problem are research and monitoring. These would include among them monitoring the impact of tobacco control programs detecting changes in tobacco consumption and tobacco-related disease for appropriate modifications in tobacco control interventions.

As a suggestion for addressing the issue, this policy brief provides research evidence of the progress and challenges in combating tobacco and its consumption in various parts of the world as well as recommendations for strengthening tobacco control. According to this policy, it is necessary to conduct a significant research into behavior change communication targeting women and girls with the aim of reducing and eliminating tobacco use. Further, there should be tighter controls aimed at reducing the availability of contraband cigarettes as well as a total ban on smoking in public places, for instance in public transport vehicles with passengers below the 12 years age bracket. Also recommended is an establishment of health promotion foundation in various selected areas funded via surcharges on the tobacco industry to promote positive health in the selected areas.

Most of the countries that have had a great success in tobacco control have done so largely due to the comprehensive health promotion approach to tobacco control adopted by their respective governments, for instance, South Africa. Among the most common ways through which tobacco control has been changed include health education both in schools and the media, the ban of cigarette sale to the minors, and increasing the price of cigarette by hiking the exercise duty to more than 50% of the total price of a single pack (Reddy & Sewpaul, 2014). Moreover, the environment which is deemed to suffer for the tobacco use can be improved via strict legislation prohibiting smoking in public areas, ending of the commercial advertisements for cigarettes in all the local media, and limiting the sponsorships of sporting and cultural events by tobacco companies (Reddy & Sewpaul, 2014). Though the economist will argue against most of these suggestions as disadvantaging the licensed tobacco producing industries, saving public health is paramount and if tobacco is compromising the same then it has to be controlled. The economy can only grow if there exists the required human-power to facilitate its growth.

One of the primary goals of improving public health is to promote the widespread prevention and treatment of tobacco. This can only be realized if the current users are treated while preventing the new users (Lando et al., 2010). This leaves the health care delivery systems to be among the critical components of tobacco cessation efforts. The measurable progress in addressing tobacco use through the health care delivery system would, therefore, include; providing wider availability of insurance coverage for tobacco cessation treatment, ensuring an increase in reported advice to quitting smoking from health care providers, and improving accountabilities for addressing tobacco in national health care reporting systems (Curry et al., 2008). With all the pros and cons considered, the paper mainly recommends the cessation of tobacco use is being the best idea to controlling the public issue.

References

Curry, S., Keller, P., Orleans, C., & Fiore, M. (2008). The Role of Health Care Systems in Increased Tobacco Cessation. Annual Review Of Public Health, 29(1), 411-428. doi: 10.1146/annurev.publhealth.29.020907.090934

Jha, P., Ramasundarahettige, C., & Landsman, V. (2013). 21st-Century Hazards of Smoking and Benefits of Cessation in the United States. Journal Of Vascular Surgery, 57(5), 1448. doi: 10.1016/j.jvs.2013.03.031

Lando, H., Hipple, B., Muramoto, M., Klein, J., Prokhorov, A., Ossip, D., & Winickoff, J. (2010). Tobacco is a global pediatric concern. Bulletin Of The World Health Organization, 88(1), 2-2. doi: 10.2471/blt.09.069583

Reddy, P., & Sewpaul, R. (2014). Policy Brief: Tobacco control and health. Human Sciences Research Council.

WHO. (2012). Gender and tobacco control: A policy brief. Department Of Gender, Women, And Health.