Larger taxes should be placed on cigarettes around the world, experts have warned – with progress on tackling tobacco use having slowed for the first time in years according to a new World Health Organisation (WHO) report.
In the past decade the number of countries with at least one tobacco control measure in place – whether that’s increased taxes, health warnings on packages, bans on advertising or smoking in public places – jumped from roughly 45 to more than 150. But of the seven such tobacco control measures recommended by the WHO, making cigarettes and other tobacco products more expensive through taxes has seen least progress.
The WHO put the overall slowing of progress down to disruptions during the Covid-19 pandemic as well as challenges posed by the need to regulate a raft of new products like vapes, which the report said “threaten[ed] to undo earlier progress made” in the more than 20 years since the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control was agreed .
“Raising prices through taxation is the most effective way to reduce tobacco use,” the WHO report said, adding that this measure had only risen from 13 per cent in 2018 to 15 per cent in 2024.
Speaking at the World Conference on Tobacco Control in Dublin, WHO director general Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said: “The greatest gains have been made in developing countries where despite aggressive industry interference, governments and civil society have demonstrated that change for the better is possible. Yet, challenges remain.“
“Raising taxes on tobacco is a proven way to reduce tobacco use while generating revenues to reinvest in health.”
Dr Tedros added that raising taxes on cigarettes could help make up for cuts to global aid funding – particularly driven by Donald Trump and the US, but also including the UK and a number of other countries – which is expected to hit tobacco control efforts.
“And with [overseas development assistance] falling or the funding level for health falling, the taxes could be used for the gaps that are happening in many countries,” he said as he also called for more research on the health impact of new tobacco and nicotine products like vapes and smokeless tobacco.
Andrew Black, who works on the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control said: “We’re facing a really challenging problem especially when it comes to securing the resources that are needed to fight tobacco”.
“What we really need to do is to encourage governments to look domestically for sources of revenue… The very obvious place to look is through tobacco taxation,” he added.
A tool developed by Johns Hopkins University in the US found increasing taxes on a pack of cigarettes in Kenya by 75 per cent could raise enough money to cover more than three-quarters of the funds lost to the country through foreign aid cuts.
Dr Guy Marks, president of the International Union Against Tuberculosis and Lung Disease, said: “The reduction in funding for global health is a huge catastrophe for many things. Actually, tobacco control is one area which should be less affected by this than most others [if governments raise tobacco taxes].”
“Why does that not happen? It does not happen, because governments are convinced that they actually gain more revenue for continuing to allow tobacco to be sold,” he added. “Why is this the case? Because there are huge political and other interests in countries that support the sale of tobacco.”
Global tobacco industry watchdog STOP estimated $1.8 trillion (£1.3tn) US dollars were lost worldwide to tobacco due to the costs of healthcare and lost wages from tobacco-related illness.
But some major strides have been made towards controlling tobacco use around the world over the past ten years. More countries have applied graphic health warnings to cigarette packs since 2007 than any other measure, with bans on smoking in public places being the next most common new measure to be introduced.
But in many cases countries applying stark health warnings to cigarette packs demand no such thing on smokeless tobacco, which the WHO said could, “wrongly suggest that some products are harmless”. And while there has been a rise in rules or bans on e-cigarettes, also known as vapes, more than 60 countries have no restrictions on sales of vapes at all.
Hazel Cheeseman, the chief executive of UK public health charity Action on Smoking and Health (ASH), said the progress was “heartening” but that there was much left to be done.
“Tobacco taxes are one of the most effective ways to reduce smoking and can also raise revenue to support health systems. With 134 countries yet to make progress in this area this is an area of significantly untapped potential,” she said.
“Ending the harms from tobacco takes time and I hope the UK government will continue to provide assistance to other countries for the long term helping to secure a planet where no one dies from tobacco related illness.”
This piece has been produced as part of The Independent’s Rethinking Global Aid series
