The World’s Biggest Killer

According to the World Health Organization smoking causes a cancer epidemic in the developing world. Smoking rates are on the growth in these regions, mainly among youth. The WHO predicts 85% of all smokers will come from the world’s poorer countries by the mid-2020s. Smoking could become the world’s biggest killer over the next 20 years, causing more deaths than HIV, tuberculosis, road accidents, murder and suicide put together. The major number of deaths will occur in developing countries. Researchers also expect death in such countries as Japan and China, where between 50% and 60 % of adults are now smokers.

WHO director-general Dr Gro Harlem Brundtland says: “Tobacco companies are trying to build up the market in the young groups in order to get as many as possible addicted before they are even grown-ups.”

The organization hopes to prevent a “smoking epidemic” with an international convention to set taxes on cigarettes worldwide and restrict tobacco advertising, including on satellite television and the Internet. Many developing countries may lose foreign investment if they clamp down on smoking but the health arguments are unanswerable. Now smoking is the preventable cause of death in the Americas. Smoking is encouraged by the low cost of cigarettes – in Latin America between 50 cents and $1.30 a pack.

Tobacco companies are planning to enlarge markets in developing countries to help make up for the loss of US smokers and point out that many of them finance cultural and social projects. But the WHO states that the alleged economic benefits of tobacco are “misleading and illusory”. Health costs related with smoking more than offset the economic benefits and ultimately have a negative result on the economy of the region.