SUPPORTERS of the generational endgame bill to stop smoking have been pressing the MPs to pass the legislation to ban the sale of cigarettes and vape to people born in and after 2007.

The Health Minister thought he scored a win when he managed to get the support of the vape businesses, only for them to cry foul later and claimed that they had been misled by the minister.

In the attempt have a smoke-free nation by 2040, many questions have been left unanswered.

Former deputy health minister Dr Lee Boon Chye said studies had shown that the government and the private sector each spend up to RM8 billion a year to treat smoking-related illnesses such as lung cancer and heart problems.

In another statement in 2021, the Health Ministry was quoted to have claimed that in 2020, RM6.2 billion of public funds was used to treat three diseases caused by smoking: lung cancer, heart disease and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. 

In the same statement, the Health Ministry stated that by 2025, it would cost the government RM7.4 billion to treat smoking-related diseases which is expected to go up to RM8.8 billion by 2030.

A cost-analysis study by Khazanah Research Institute (KRI) in March 2018 estimated that the total annual healthcare cost attributable to smoking was RM132.7 million for lung cancer, RM544.5 million for heart disease and RM2.2 billion for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, amounting to RM2.9 billion. 

In the same report, KRI states that while a non-smoker will have greatly reduced risks of developing lung cancer they may subsequently experience ageing-related conditions, which may pose greater financial healthcare burden over a longer period while a person who smokes may develop lung cancer and die prematurely, which would pose a financial burden, but a short-lived one, to the government.

As such, KRI concluded that tobacco control measures may not actually avoid healthcare costs but instead only postpone, or even prolong healthcare costs in the long term.

According to official statistics, in 2021, about five million Malaysians (22.8%) aged 15 years and over, were smokers. 

Despite the arguments over the GEG, almost everyone seems to agree that something must be done about smoking. The disagreement is over the manner in which it should be done.

It appears that very little discussion was carried out with all the stakeholders prior to the drafting of the Tobacco Product and Smoking Control Bill 2022. 

After the first reading, the health minister readily agreed to reduce the fines from RM5,000 to RM500 for those caught selling smoking products to the barred group. He also clarified that convictions under the law would not lead to a criminal record while those in the target age group caught buying would receive a maximum RM50 fine.

Additionally, the powers to stop, search and seize that the bill proposes to invest in the enforcement officers clearly leave a lot of room for interpretation and abuse.

The law may even hinder efforts to investigate and prosecute offenders.

A badly drafted legislation will only make more work for the courts. 

And as every study on addiction has shown, be it to drugs or alcohol, criminalising it does more harm than good.

The death penalty for drug trafficking was mandated in 1983 yet drug abuse continues to go unchecked.

Does the health minister really believe that the bill will stop people from taking up smoking? – August 3, 2022.

* FLK reads The Malaysian Insight.