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Doctors dismayed after Karnataka HC strikes down 85 per cent warning on tobacco packs 

The bigger warning on packets came following a July 2015 Rajasthan High Court order, which asked the Centre and the state government to implement a 2014 government notification mandating 85-per cent warnings.

Doctors dismayed after Karnataka HC strikes down 85 per cent warning on tobacco packs  A roadside vendor selling tobacco products. (File photo)

While the Karnataka High Court on Friday struck down rules mandating 85 per cent warning — image and text — on packets of tobacco products, and ruled that the earlier 40-per cent warning norm should be restored, anti-tobacco activists and many doctors cite latest India figures of the Global Adult Tobacco Survey (GATS) 2016-17 to point at the “success” of bigger warning on packs.

Second-round GATS 2016-17 has a section on impact of large tobacco pack warnings, which shows that 62 per cent cigarette smokers and 54 per cent beedi smokers thought of quitting because of the warning label on the packets, Dr Pankaj Chaturvedi, head and neck cancer surgeon at Tata Memorial Hospital, Mumbai, said. “Also, 46 per cent of smokeless tobacco users thought of quitting because of the warning label on these products. These are encouraging figures,” he said. “Thanks to these images, there has been a change in perception, which is why 92 per cent of adults surveyed believed smoking caused serious illness, and 96 per cent said use of smokeless tobacco causes serious illness.”

According to Dr Chaturvedi, health warnings on tobacco products are the “most cost-effective tool to educate (people) on the health risks of tobacco use”.

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The bigger warning on packets came following a July 2015 Rajasthan High Court order, which asked the Centre and the state government to implement a 2014 government notification mandating 85-per cent warnings.

On the Karnataka High Court ruling, Dr Vishal Rao, an oncologist based in the state, said, “We don’t still know what yesterday’s order exactly says. Lawyers present in court are giving out contradictory versions on it. However, if the bench has struck down the 85-per cent pictorial warnings, then this order is a major setback for public health. It is critical to protect the youth from the dangers of tobacco.”

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Bhavna Mukhopadhyay of the Voluntary Health Association of India said, “It’s a sad day for public health in India — these warnings were proven highly effective by the recent Global Adult Tobacco Survey, conducted by Government of India, in preventing millions from starting to use tobacco and even getting users to think about quitting”.

Bigger pictorial warnings were first mandated by a notification issued in October 2014. The then Health Minister, Dr Harsh Vardhan, and then Health Secretary Keshav Desiraju were removed in quick succession, leading to a buzz that their removals were the machinations of the tobacco lobby. The notification was then taken up suo motu by the Lok Sabha Committee on Subordinate Legislation, which asked the government to put the implementation on hold. While the implementation was then stayed, Rajasthan HC in July 2015 asked the government to implement it.

First uploaded on: 17-12-2017 at 03:08 IST
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