Despite of constant warning from the health workers on the hazards of smoking, the incidence of smoking among Indians has not fallen. Smoking is responsible for the death of nearly a million of Indians every year. According to a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine, Indians start smoking at a later age than that in the west and uses the unfiltered brands of cigarettes that have been found to carry a greater health hazard responsible for a million deaths in the country.

In India, bidis or the traditional cigarettes made of ‘kendu’ leaves are popular among the poor. The unfiltered tobacco smoking using bidis is more hazardous than the filtered brands of cigarettes. The result is unlike in the west larger number of deaths in India among smokers is from tuberculosis and not from lung cancer. Smoking unfiltered bidis cause enough damage to the lungs that makes it difficult for the body to contain latent infections that causes asymptomatic tuberculosis.

A major difficulty that the Indian government faces in its effort to curb smoking in the country is its inability to reduce production of tobacco products as a large number of Indians are employed in this sector.

According to latest projections, smoking will account for one-fifth of all male deaths and one out of every twenty female deaths. Cigarettes and bidis are not the only form of consumption of tobacco in India, in fact a large number of Indians chew tobaccos present in gutkhas that are popular among the young and aged Indians.

Strengthening of the Indian Tobacco Regulatory Authority is the only way of enforcing strict anti-tobacco laws in the country.

Via:reuters