‘Dial a friend’ option now available on cigarette packs

The report states that well designed package warnings are highly cost effective means to increase awareness of the health effects and to reduce tobacco use. 
Newly designed cigarette boxes with the ‘Quit today’ toll number on them, in Hyderabad on Wednesday | R satish Babu
Newly designed cigarette boxes with the ‘Quit today’ toll number on them, in Hyderabad on Wednesday | R satish Babu

HYDERABAD: If you bought a cigarette packet in the past a few days, you would have observed changes on the pack like the photos of people suffering from cancer and health warnings have changed and a toll-free number is displayed too.

Officials from the National Tobacco Control Programme (NTCP) said that people can get the address of tobacco cessation centres by dialling the number.  When the number 1800-11-2356 was dialled on Wednesday night, the automatic voice response stated that the service is available from 8 A.M. to 8 P.M. while every Monday is a holiday.

Earlier, the photos on the packets showed people with the throat, neck cancer and a message ‘Smoking causes throat cancer’. Now, the new packets display photo of a person suffering from Oral cancer, displays the message ‘Smoking causes cancer’ and the toll-free number is displayed. The changes are implemented based on the central government’s rules which state that health warnings display on all tobacco products packages covering at least 85 per cent of the principal display area is mandatory.

“According to Central government rules, the photo will change after September 1, 2019. The current photo is supposed to be displayed on all packets manufactured or imported or packaged on or after September 1, 2018. India is the only country among SAARC nations to display the quitline number,” said Binoy Mathew, communication officer, Voluntary Health Association of India which working towards implementation and enforcement of tobacco control rules.

According to the recently released ‘The cigarette Package Health Warnings-International Status Report’ released by Canadian Cancer Society, India ranks in the fifth position in terms of Health warning size as an average of front and back. Our nation shares the fifth rank along with Hong Kong and Thailand.

The international status report was released at the eighth session of ‘Conference of the Parties to the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control’, held in Geneva. The report states that well-designed package warnings are highly cost-effective means to increase awareness of the health effects and to reduce tobacco use. 

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