WHO goes tough on smoking in movies

The World Health Organization, WHO, has reeled out measures against promotion of smoking in movies, globally. Prominent among the measures is the rating of films showing smoking scenes “to help protect children from tobacco addiction.

” A release on the agency’s website on Monday recommended age classification ratings for films with tobacco imagery “to reduce overall exposure of youth to tobacco imagery in films; certifying in movie credits that film producers receive nothing of value from anyone in exchange for using or displaying tobacco products in a film; ending display of tobacco brands in films; and requiring that strong antismoking advertisements be shown before films containing tobacco imagery in all distribution channels (cinemas, televisions, online, etc).

” The recommendations accompanied WHO’s Smoke-Free Movie Report. “Movies showing use of tobacco products have enticed millions of young people worldwide to start smoking”, the release said. WHO noted that movies “hook millions of young people on tobacco” and that “taking concrete steps, including rating films with tobacco scenes and displaying tobacco warnings before films with tobacco, can stop children around the world from being introduced to tobacco products and subsequent tobacco-related addiction, disability and death.

” “With ever tighter restrictions on tobacco advertising, film remains one of the last channels exposing millions of adolescents to smoking imagery without restrictions,” WHO’s Director for the Department of Prevention of Non-communicable Diseases, Dr Douglas Bettcher, was quoted as saying in the release. Bettcher was quoted further as saying “smoking in films can be a strong form of promotion for tobacco products…”The 180 Parties to the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (WHO FCTC) are obliged by international law to ban tobacco advertising, promotion and sponsorship.

” The release explained that studies in the United States of America had shown that on-screen smoking accounts for 37 percent of all new adolescent smokers. It informed that in 2014, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimated that in the United States alone, exposure to onscreen smoking would recruit more than six million new, young smokers from among American children that year, of which it said two million would ultimately die from tobacco-induced diseases.

 Source:nationalmirroronline