Protecting Children from Tobacco
Over 205,000 Australian school children are smoking on a weekly basis. 24% of them are illegally supplied by tobacco retailers. Tobacco is not a matter of ‘informed adult lifestyle choice’ as misleadingly portrayed by the tobacco industry – it is in fact routinely a result of childhood recruitment and addiction. Any society worth its salt protects its children. We need to protect our children from tobacco promotion and exposure.
The Action on Smoking and Health have actively campaigned all Australian governments, as a matter of urgent public interest, to legislate to:
1. End tobacco advertising in all retail outlets by removing all tobacco products from open public view – as for many pharmaceuticals;
2. End tobacco sales by children in shops;
3. Fully implement a licensing scheme for tobacco sellers to improve regulation, as for alcohol, and
4. Mandate that cars carrying children should be smoke-free by law to save lives and children’s health.
The problem
Smoking costs Australia over $21 billion a year – more than three times the excise revenue collected by the federal government.
The annual cost to our hospital system is almost $700 million. In 2001-02 alone: more than 300,000 hospitalisations, occupying nearly 1.5 million hospital bed days, from smoking related illness.
Tobacco remains the leading cause of preventable deaths in NSW – killing more than 6,000 people each year, costing the state around $6.6 billion and causing some 150 public hospital admissions a day. Around 18% of NSW adults are current smokers.
Smoking is often described as paediatric disease – 80 to 90% of smokers start as teenagers, many as young as 12 years old. The younger the uptake, the more likely the development of severe nicotine addiction. Each year 45,000 Australian children become regular smokers.
Of 12-17 year olds, 21% have smoked tobacco in the last 12 months and 10.3% are current smokers. Half of these new young smokers are expected to become long-term users, and half of those will be killed by their addiction.
The tobacco industry has a history of targeting children. Tobacco products are widely and prominently displayed in thousands of NSW shops – supermarkets, convenience stores, petrol stations, newsagents, newsstands, corner shops, and more – even though their use as directed causes heart disease, stroke, emphysema, blindness, and many cancers. In children, tobacco is strongly linked to respiratory ailments and learning difficulties.
Exposure to tobacco displays in shops ‘normalises’ smoking in the eyes of children, predisposing them to smoke more.
Many shops allow children (under 18) to sell tobacco products – further normalising it to both the underage seller and children entering shops.
Preventing children from becoming regular users is a key goal of NSW Government strategies to reduce tobacco diseases. The NSW State Plan aims to reduce smoking rates by 1% annually to 2010 and then a further 0.5% annually to 2016. To achieve this target, new measures are required.
Children have easy access to cigarettes: 23% of schoolchildren aged 12-17 (and 29% of 16-17 year olds) purchase their own products in shops – despite it being illegal to sell or supply to children.
1. Why tobacco displays should be banned
Strong independent research evidence shows retail display normalises tobacco to children and predisposes them towards smoking.
Retail display of tobacco products is a powerful form of advertising – which operates 24/7 and offers an immediate sale. The tobacco industry knows displays aim to stimulate trial purchase and repurchase.
Cigarette displays may help to recruit younger starters mote likely to try a variety of brands during experimentation.
Shop display undermines attempts to quit smoking by tempting would be quitters (including children and pregnant women) into ‘impulse buying’.
Putting tobacco totally out of sight in shops is a worldwide trend. Tasmania has legislated for it; the ACT has introduced legislation. So have two countries (Iceland and Thailand) and 8 Canadian provinces and territories.
Australia is obliged by its ratification of the international Framework Convention on Tobacco Control to undertake a comprehensive ban on tobacco advertising and promotion.
2. Why children should not sell tobacco products
Many children working in shops are expected to sell addictive, tobacco products as part of their job. As there is currently no restriction on the age of tobacco sellers, many children have no choice but to handle and sell drugs that cause 19,000 deaths a year.
Opponents of restricting tobacco sales to adult staff claim that some shops that are family-run or in rural areas may find it difficult if they cannot use children to sell tobacco products. However, children are rarely left unaccompanied or unsupervised by an adult. The adult, not the child, should have the responsibility for conducting the sale, just as they would with alcohol or pharmaceutical products.
Arguments for restricting tobacco selling to adult staff
Australia has ratified an international treaty on public health – the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control – that includes articles 16 (7) prohibiting the sale of tobacco products by anyone under the age of 18 years.
As children do not have sufficient maturity and are susceptible to peer pressure, research confirms that the age of the seller is associated with increased sales of tobacco products to children.
Children cannot sell other drugs, such as alcohol, and even adults who sell alcohol are required by law to complete accredited training courses in responsible selling.
Stopping children from selling tobacco products is more consistent with laws that prohibit children from being supplied these products.
Some other jurisdictions, including Norway and Singapore, have more socially responsible policies in place that prohibit tobacco sales by anyone under the age of 18 years.
3. The case for licensing tobacco sellers
Tobacco sellers, like alcohol sellers, should be licensed – to prevent illegal sale to children, and to cover costs of regulation including retailer education, and compliance monitoring.
In 2002, the Commonwealth commissioned a report into the desirability and best practice arrangements for the licensing of tobacco retailers and wholesalers. The findings, endorsed by the Intergovernmental Committee on Drugs, are yet to be fully implemented.
The report, by the Allen Consultancy Group, examined both the benefits and the objections and concluded that there is “a strong case, based on economic and public health rationales, to introduce licensing of tobacco sellers.” The report said:
– All tobacco wholesalers and retailers should hold licenses. – Compliance with general tobacco control laws should be the minimum operational standard required by a licence holder. – There should be scope for conditions to be applied to licenses where this supports compliance with tobacco control laws. – A licence should be able to be refused or withdrawn if the responsible person has contravened tobacco control laws. – Licence fees should be set to recover only the costs associated with the following: administration of the licensing scheme, enforcement of the licenses including inspections, and provision of information to applicants and licensees to ensure their continued and future compliance. – Tobacco sales licensing should be seen as a health issue and controlled by health officials who may contract out elements of the scheme (licensing, inspections, enforcement,) to third parties. – There should be a graduated penalty structure that includes warnings, penalties, prosecutions, and scope for licence withdrawal.The authors concluded that the impediments – industry concerns about the cost of the schemes, some jurisdictional hesitancy, and the general regulatory move away from licensing – should be countered on the grounds that tobacco licensing schemes are clearly in the public interest.
Four Australian jurisdictions – South Australia, Western Australia, Tasmania, and the ACT – require tobacco sellers to be licensed.
4. Cars with kids should be smokefree
The evidence is compelling that smoking in vehicles endangers children by exposing them to secondhand smoke, to increased risk of car crashes, and to fires within vehicles.
Children are harmed by secondhand smoke
The evidence of secondhand smoke harm to children in enclosed spaces is extensive and beyond dispute. The US Surgeon-General has concluded that there is no risk-free level of secondhand smoke exposure and that children are especially vulnerable. Health harm to children from secondhand smoke includes SIDS, meningococcal disease, asthma, bronchitis, middle ear infections, cognitive harm, and more. A recent Australian study in the Medical Journal of Australia shows teenage asthma risk doubled by secondhand smoke exposure in cars. The University of Western Australia authors back calls for banning smoking in cars carrying children.
Smoking while driving is a safety hazard
Research also shows smoking while driving is clearly a danger – and more serious than other distractions like mobile phones or eating, since smoking involves the risk of dropping burning matter into the driver’s lap.
Recent studies on smoking and car safety were reviewed by Monash University Accident Research Centre in 2003 which found that smokers have an increased risk of being involved in motor crashes, and actual distraction caused by the act of smoking is a likely factor. The review concludes that “it is clear that smoking while driving is a hazard.” One study cited connects it with over 2,000 crashes a year.
Smoking in cars is a fire hazard
There is also evidence that many fires are started from lit cigarettes being thrown from car windows. The NSW Fire Service estimates around 4% of all cigarettes thrown from cars start some kind of fire. Cigarettes can also cause fires inside cars – sometimes with fatal results involving children.
These recommendations are endorsed by a growing list of National and NSW health, medical, children/youth, church and community groups:
Endorsed by:
Action on Smoking and Health Australia, Alcohol and other Drugs Council of Australia, Association for the Welfare of Child Health, Australian and New Zealand Society of Respiratory Science, Australian Childhood Foundation, Australian Council of Social Service, Australian Council of State School Organisations, Australian Council on Smoking and Health, Australian Educational Union, Australian Foster Care Association, Australian General Practice Network, Australian Lions Drug Awareness Foundation, Australian National Council on Drugs, Australian Parents’ Council, Australian Youth Affairs Coalition, Baptist Union of NSW, Catholic Health Australia, Children’s Cancer Institute Australia for Medical Research, Cystic Fibrosis Australia, Early Childhood Australia, Families Australia, Murdoch Children’s Research Institute, National Association for Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect, National Asthma Council of Australia, National Heart Foundation of Australia, NSW Council of Churches, Public Affairs Commission of the Anglican Church of Australia, Public Health Association of Australia, Royal Australasian College of General Practitioners, Rural Doctors Association of Australia, Save the Children Australia, SIDS and Kids, Smarter than Smoking, Telethon Institute for Child Health Research, The Australian Lung Foundation, The Cancer Council NSW, and Thoracic Society of Australia and New Zealand.
Information Sourced from: Action on Smoking and Health Information Kit, April 2008
