Jakarta (ANTARA) – Health expert Prof. Tjandra Yoga Aditama has highlighted the need for including stricter regulations prohibiting cigarette advertising and promotion in the revised Government Regulation Number 109 of 2012 amid an increasing trend of smokers.
“So, there must be a ban (regulation) on advertising and promotion, and sponsorship that is even better and more strict in the revision,” he said at a media discussion held by the Indonesia Institute for Social Development (IISD), which was followed online from here on Monday.
Aditama, former director of infectious diseases at the World Health Organization (WHO), South-East Asia, and currently a professor at the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Indonesia, said that the global trend of smokers has shown a decline.
The number of male smokers declined from 893 million in 2007 to 847 million in 2019, while among women, the figure dropped from 189 million to 153 million in 2019.
In Indonesia, a decline has not been seen; in fact, an increase has occurred, he pointed out.
“There has been an increase in Indonesia–from 61.4 million people, it (the figure) rose to 70.2 million in 10 years,” he noted.
During the discussion, he said that a comparison of data of Indonesian smokers in 2011 and 2021 by the Indonesia Global Adult Tobacco Survey showed an increase of around 1 million smokers per year in the country.
In addition to the increase in the number of smokers, cigarette sales also increased by 7.2 percent in 2021 compared to the previous year. Meanwhile, the use of e-cigarettes also rose from 0.3 percent in 2011 to 3 percent in 2021.
Therefore, Government Regulation Number 109 of 2012 concerning the safeguarding of materials containing addictive substances in the form of tobacco products for health needs to be revised in order to protect the nation.
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