Annual health service costs for treating tobacco-related illnesses are the same, at €1 billion, as the cuts being sought in the public sector wage bill, the Dáil has heard.
“It would be better if we could reduce our health bill by €1 billion,” Minister for Health James Reilly said as the Dáil passed the Public Health (Tobacco) (Amendment) Bill which obliges manufacturers to put graphic images on cigarette packets of the illnesses caused by smoking.
Dr Reilly held up a number of cigarette packets in the chamber to highlight the “new tactics being used by the tobacco industry to promote new products and ensnare young people, including those under 18”.
One of the packs was “slim and nicely presented, and has the name of a high-end fashion magazine attached to it”, he said. He said 78 per cent of smokers started smoking before they were 18.
“No parent wants their children to smoke, regardless of whether they are a smoker or non-smoker,” he said, and the Government’s aim was to “denormalise tobacco and make it socially unacceptable for our children and young people to smoke”.
Independent TD and publican Michael Healy-Rae said the high prices in Ireland compared to the rest of the EU had left a big opening for the illegal tobacco trade.
“There is no reason in the world that a person in Ireland should be paying €10 for a pack of cigarettes when a person in another part of Europe can pay €1.80 or €2 for the same thing. That is leaving the illegal trade wide open.”
Smoking habits
Mr Healy-Rae, who had been “selling cigarettes for over 20 years”, said he had seen and studied people’s smoking habits.
“I have every sympathy for hardened addicted smokers who find it terribly difficult to give up smoking and who probably in many cases will never give up smoking. They will leave this world continuing their habit.”
Source: Marie O'Halloran, Irish Times, 01/03/13
Safer Student Nights
eBulletin
Poll
