EU Hopes Grim Photos on Packets Will Deter Smokers
Date: 27-May-05
Country: BELGIUM
Author: Jeremy Smith
Belgium, Britain, Ireland and Latvia have expressed interest in the database, unveiled by the European Commission in October but unavailable until now to EU states for legal reasons.
While the Commission wants to see the photos on cigarette packets throughout the 25-nation bloc, using them will be voluntary.
"They're explicit, easily understood and they attract attention," EU Health and Consumer Protection Commissioner Markos Kyprianou told a news conference.
"We need something new that you can't get used to, like rotten teeth, wrinkled skin and skin cancer. That's why we think they will be effective," he said. "But I anticipate some reaction on the part of industry."
Besides the pictures, three anti-smoking ads would be shown on tv in all 25 EU countries in early June to "de-glamorise" tobacco for the young, Kyprianou said.
Aimed at young people between 12 and 30, they substitute party whistles for cigarettes to "highlight how ridiculous smoking really is", a Commission statement said, adding that 80 percent of smokers start the habit in their teens.
The pictures and adverts are part of the Commission's latest campaign to stamp out smoking and reduce hundreds of thousands of deaths attributed to it each year.
The campaign is the EU's second and will cost 72 million euros ($91 million) up to 2008. The first ended in December and cost 18 million euros over three years.
More than 650,000 Europeans die every year from the effects of smoking, imposing an annual bill of more than 100 billion euros in sickness and death costs on EU governments, the Commission says.
"The de-glamorisation of tobacco products, that they're not 'cool' -- in fact, they're ridiculous -- is the target of this campaign," Kyprianou said. "We have seen that smoking is going down among adults but it's increasing among the young."
Over the years, the EU has taken legal steps on tobacco control. From July, all tobacco advertising on radio, on the internet and in print media will be banned in EU countries and has been banned EU-wide on television since 1989.
Since 2003, EU law also requires high-visibility, hard-hitting health warnings on all tobacco products sold in the bloc. It also bans cigarette labels such as "light" or "mild".
