Myanmar: Tobacco Companies Get Extra Time to Put Graphic Health Warnings on Products

The deadline for cigarette companies to put gruesome images alongside health warnings on their products has been extended by six months after the tobacco industry complained it would be too difficult to recall packs without the new warnings in time.
 

Although the Ministry of Health and Support announced the new warnings and issued a notification in August last year, cigarette companies told the government they needed extra time to comply with the new rules.  
 

"Legal action will be effective from early next year," said Dr Thuzar Chittin of the Public Health Department under the Ministry of Health. The new law will still apply to products manufactured after September 1st – only unsold packs manufactured before that date are subject to the six-month extension.
 

Anyone involved in the sale of a tobacco product without a warning after the amnesty period ends will be subject to a fine of between K10,000 and K30,000 for the first offense, and up to a year in prison and a K100,000 fine for subsequent offenses.
 

Smoking rates have soared since the return of global tobacco companies such as British American Tobacco to Myanmar in 2013, says May Myat Cho of the Southeast Asia Tobacco Control Alliance. The rate of male smokers was 46.8% in 2013, she said, but is now over 60%.
 

The new rules are an amendment to the 2006 Control of Smoking and Consumption of Tobacco Product Law. Public health experts and others say tobacco companies in Myanmar are regularly flouting the law, which bans all forms of tobacco promotion. Enditem