Smokers are at higher risks of severe COVID-19 outcomes__ FG warns

The Federal government has said that tobacco consumers and those with underlying non-communicable diseases were at higher risks of severe COVID-19 outcomes.

While speaking in Abuja on Monday at a program organized to mark World No Tobacco Day with the theme, ‘Commit to Quit.’, the Minister of Health, Dr. Osagie Ehanire stated smokers should quit, because of COVID complications.

Moreso, Ehanire said with the evidence available on the contribution of tobacco to the severity of COVID-19, assisting smokers to quit would improve the way the pandemic was handled.

He said the Federal Government was planning to expand the frontiers in the war against tobacco usage in the country.

Parts of the strategy, he added, were to make tobacco products unaffordable, promote increased awareness on risks and increase access to tobacco cessation services.

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“The tobacco industry prefers more smokers and encourages long-term smoking and has even introduced electronic smoking devices, falsely claimed to be less harmful than the conventional cigarettes,” the minister said.

Meanwhile, a human rights organization, under the aegis of the Civil Society Legislative Advocacy Centre, on Monday said tobacco killed 16,100 smokers in Nigerians annually.

The Executive Director of CISLAC, Auwal Musa Rafsanjani, said this in Abuja at a media briefing in commemoration of the 2021 World No Tobacco Day.

According to him, surveys have shown that although 80 percent of smokers will like to quit smoking, “less than five percent are able to quit on their own due to the highly addictive properties of nicotine.”

Rafsanjani said, “This calls for clearly defined efforts to help smokers break the addiction to nicotine and quit smoking ultimately rather than relying on the ineffective approach of leaving smokers to quit on their own.”

He added, “Nigeria is the most populous country in Africa and has one of the leading tobacco markets with over 18 billion cigarettes annually. The WHO data accounts for an estimated 16,100 deaths arising from tobacco use annually in Nigeria.

“As we celebrate the WNTD today, CISLAC is calling on government at all levels in Nigeria to invest in promoting cessation by developing evidence-based and cost-effective strategies.”