Tobacco control law in Oman

[Karim]

6 years a go, I packed my belongings and moved to Qatar. While in Qatar I had to accept the daily ordeal of being a secondary smoker every time I enter a public place, shopping malls, restaurants, government offices, airport, barber shop, I mean every square centimeter that is air-conditioned will have tobacco stench, save the hospitals, I hope. One year into my stay in Qatar, and the Qatari government wised up to what is happening, and introduced a ground breaking tobacco control law, and the effects were almost instantaneous. By the time I left Qatar, the country witnessed one of the sharpest juvenile smoking declines in the world.



Now back in Oman, a country I left were young Omanis rarely smoke now is undergoing an ugly transformation, it is very common to see very young Omanis smoke, I saw a young Omani cashier girl smoke in city centre, the prevalence of smoking upon the young is increasing at an alarming rate. On the other hand, all what we hear from people who are responsible of public health is that they are looking into introducing a tobacco control law, they have been looking into this for as long as I remember, and nothing has been done yet, and more young Omanis are becoming tobacco addicts by the day, and our government officials are studying it, do we have dyslectic government officials? What is it to study and to look into? Just ban smoking in public places, how difficult is it?

[Mti]

Smoking cigarettes is frowned upon especially by adherents of the Ibadhi sect and Omanies in general. During The Reign of Sultan Sayyid Said smoking was totally banned and anyone found doing so was jailed for a month. Times have changed. Our youngsters are abusing the newly found freedom by "going up in smoke" rather than form better habits.



Banning smoking in public is not difficult. Am sure the municipality will come up with new by-laws that ban smoking in public.

[Neo]

I have read somewhere, some sort of pictorial warning will be placed in all cigarette.



Personally, I have seen these pictorial warning while I was working in Indonesia, and it doesn't help at all



Karim,



What is that ground breaking smoking law that QATAR introduced?

[marianna]

Smoking is a nasty a$$ habit. It ages you prematurely and can aggrevate a lot of health conditions not to mention put a person at risk for lung cancer. I saw what it has done to my dad, he smoked 3 1/2 packs a day. He started smoking at 14 and HAD to quit at 62. The doc said if he did NOT quit he would die in two years. Sooooo...he quit cold turkey. Smoking leaves behind a bad odor and who the hell wants a mate to kiss that smells and tastes like an ashtray. Man don't get this gal started!

[Dr Death]

i went 2 zakher shopping mall the other day 2 have lunch at caravans ..... i was shocked !! the air was so full of smoke i couldnt breath !! i mean every1 who was sitting in th lobby in front of the resturants was smoking !!! i thought what the hell ??!! wasnt there a law banning smoking in shopping malls ?

[sahih]

Mti Said: Smoking cigarettes is frowned upon especially by adherents of the Ibadhi sect and Omanies in general. During The Reign of Sultan Sayyid Said smoking was totally banned and anyone found doing so was jailed for a month. Times have changed. Our youngsters are abusing the newly found freedom by "going up in smoke" rather than form better habits.



Banning smoking in public is not difficult. Am sure the municipality will come up with new by-laws that ban smoking in public.







to add more info;



even during imamm era in NIZWA, when somebody found to be smoking he/she will get 80 slashes as punishment for smoking,as completely regarded as HARAAM,,,,,,it took so many years people to accept that its HARAAM,,,,,when u ask why its HARAAM,,,,the answer because its cause you many disease,,,,and NOW its proofs that is CAUSE CANCER.

[marianna]

If they want to smoke do it in their homes but not out in public. I have that same mentality here. I don't want to be at a resturant enjoying a good meal only to have it spoiled by the acrid smell of digusting smoke.

[Karim]

Neo



It was ground breaking for Qatar, as the country has one of the highest smoking prevalence in the world, some figures put it at around 7 out of 10 adult male to have smoked at least once in the past 5 years, and the figure for women was alarmingly high as well, at 3. Smoking in Qatar was so ingrained in the society, introducing the law was near impossible because of resistant, and META (Middle East Tobacco Association) ability to penetrate the government to stop or slow down progress towards anti tobacco legislations that actually work.



Tobacco companies nowadays admit that Smoking is addictive and that it causes cancer, and they have put this show that they work with the government to control the habit, META is classical example, I feel that META has penetrated the decision makers in Oman, and META is feeding the decision makers these solutions, solutions the whole world and the WTO have proved as not working, namely the pictograms and rehabilitating smokers.



The only working solution is to stop youngsters from becoming smokers, the current smokers are done deal, quitting smoking is very very difficult, and it is almost impossible to formulate legislations that will make smokers quit, the solution is in stopping young people from becoming addicted, and you do this by reducing the duration where one can smoke. As we spend most of our mornings in Offices and schools that prohibit smoking, we find a venue to smoke in the evenings in public places, as legislations squeeze out this venue, the habit will have difficulty setting foot in new lungs.



Oman is taking the wrong direction in its fight against tobacco, a direction prescribed to us by non other than the same people who make tobacco.