Smoking in India
In India, the current prevalence of smoking among adults aged 15 years and older was estimated to be 9.3% in 2024, reflecting an increase from 8.1% in 2020. The current smoking prevalence among adult males was significantly higher with 16.7% in 2024, compared to 1.4% among adult females. This gender disparity has been consistent, as in 2020, the prevalence among males was 14.4% and 1.40% among females. The total number of smokers in 2024 was approximately 100,2 million individuals, showing an increase from 80,481,112 in 2020. For reference, the adult daily smoking prevalence in 2017 was 8.6%, with a prevalence of 15.2% among males and 1.7% among females. Smoking-related mortality remains a significant health concern in India, with 1,048,266 deaths recorded in 2021. This accounts for 8.92% of all deaths in the country. Of these deaths, 233,679 were recorded among female, representing 4.59% of all female deaths, while 814,587 were male, accounting for 12.23% of all male deaths. These data underscore the ongoing public health challenges posed by tobacco smoking in India, highlighting the necessity for effective public health measures to reduce smoking prevalence and its associated mortalities.
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October 11, 2018 by indialegallive.com
How safe are E-Cigarettes?
That tobacco kills is a fact. Globally, more than 60 lakh of these deaths are the result of direct tobacco use, while around 8.9 lakh are due to non-smokers being exposed to second-hand smoke. Smoking-related deaths are expected to increase to 80 lakh by 2030. Hence, it is important to reduce it, otherwise an estimated one billion lives will be lost prematurely by 2100, according to the Annual Review of Public Health. And this is where e-cigarettes come in.
October 01, 2018 by indiatimes.com
Smoke and mirrors: Why TN must reverse ban on e-cigarettes
Tobacco sustains 50 million livelihoods in India and earns substantial revenue through exports and tax, but it also kills a million citizens every year and mounts an economic burden of over Rs 1 lakh crore in direct and indirect costs.
Caught between these two competing forces are the country’s 27 crore users who find themselves pushed to the frontlines in the state’s half-hearted war against tobacco.
September 27, 2018 by thehindu.com
E-cigarette sale continues unabated in Rajasthan
Despite the Centre’s advisory issued last month asking the States to stop the sale of electronic nicotine delivery systems (ENDS) which use a nicotine-laced liquid, the Rajasthan government is yet to take action to protect the adolescents and youths against nicotine addiction. The sale of e-cigarettes continues unabated in the State. The Union Ministry of Health & Family Welfare had asked all States in an advisory issued on August 28 that the ENDS, [...] were not sold, manufactured, distributed, traded, imported and advertised in any manner.
September 25, 2018 by indiatimes.com
Difficult to catch hookah bars adding nicotine: Special Task Force
A special task force team of state drug controller has registered 37
cases against hookah bars across Haryana since
December 2017. Four such cases have been registered in
Panchkula alone. As of now, the authorities are finding it difficult to register anymore cases as hookah bars have stopped using flavours mixed with nicotine and were only adding nicotine as per the demand — that too in quantity, which is hard to trace.
September 13, 2018 by indiatimes.com
Tamil Nadu Bans E-Cigarettes
The Tamil Nadu government has passed an order banning the sale of e-cigarettes (electronic nicotine delivery system or ENDS) with immediate effect. The health and family welfare department passed a government order (GO), dated September 3, banning e-cigarettes with immediate effect. The government has banned manufacture, sale, distribution, trade, trade, marketing, import and possession of the electronic nicotine delivery systems.
September 02, 2018 by thehindu.com
Group questions Centre advisory on e-cigarette ban
The recent advisory issued by the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare to the State government seeking a ban on sale of Electronic Nicotine Delivery Systems (ENDS) [...] is based on “poor advice, lack of scientific evidence and complete absence of basis,” said a group representing e-cigarette users across the country. The Association of Vapers India (AVI), an organisation that represents e-cigarette users across the country, has hit back at the Centre and questioned the motive behind the advisory.
August 31, 2018 by deccanchronicle.com
E-cigarettes ban was long overdue, say city doctors
The Centre’s decision to ban e-cigarettes has been welcomed by doctors and health professionals in the city, who believe it is long due. Responding, Dr Satayanarayana Mysore, head of the department of interventional pulmonology and sleep medicine at Manipal Hospitals in the city, says the ban on e-cigarettes is a positive step as they have several side effects. “Considering how harmful they are, they must be completely avoided,” he adds.
August 29, 2018 by reuters.com
India's health ministry calls for halting sales of e-cigarettes, smoking devices
India’s federal health ministry called on Tuesday for stopping the sale or import of electronic cigarettes and heat-not-burn tobacco devices that companies like Philip Morris International Inc were planning to launch in the country. India has stringent laws to deter tobacco use, which the government says kills more than 900,000 people every year. But the country still has 106 million adult smokers, second only to China according to the World Health Organization.
August 22, 2018 by thehindu.com
HC raps Centre for delaying implementation of rules on e-cigarettes
The Delhi High Court on Tuesday took strong exception to Centre’s indecision in coming up with regulatory measures on manufacture, import, sale and any kind of trade in e-cigarettes in the country. A Bench of Chief Justice Rajendra Menon and Justice V. Kameswar Rao asked the Centre to indicate in an affidavit a time frame within which the regulatory measures will be brought into place and ‘enforced in letter and spirit’.
August 21, 2018 by indiatimes.com
New images for pictorial warning, 'quit line' number on tobacco product packs
The health ministry on Monday issued new images for the pictorial warning on packs of cigarette and other tobacco products
The new pictures, which will be used with effect from September 1, will have to be accompanied with a quitline number. According to a health ministry order, all packs of tobacco products must have "tobacco causes cancer" and "tobacco causes painful death" written in white on a red background, [...]