November 17- World Lung Cancer Day
GAZETTE
EVERY DAY, TOBACCO CAUSES 62 DEATHS AND MAKES 183 PEOPLE ILL IN NIGERIA
The consumption of cigarettes and other tobacco products in Nigeria causes, every day, 62 deaths and 101.213 new cases of illness, which implies losses of ₦630.072 million in the health system and the country's economy, as emerged from a modeling analysis led by researchers from the Institute of Clinical and Health Effectiveness (IECS), an academic institution affiliated with the Faculty of Medicine from the University of Buenos Aires (UBA), in Argentina, which is home to a collaborating center of the World Health Organization (WHO).
The results, which are disseminated in coincidence with the World Lung Cancer Day, reveal that the impact of cigarettes on health is not limited to this serious tumor and also confirm that only a minimal proportion of direct and indirect expenses are compensated by the taxes charged to tobacco companies.
“Our study makes it clear that smoking is not only harmful to health, but has a huge economic implication “which should encourage countries to apply the different control measures proposed by the World Health Organization (WHO),” said the lead author, Dr. Andrés Pichon-Riviere, general director of the IECS, master's degree in Clinical Epidemiology from Harvard University, doctor in Public Health and principal investigator of the National Scientific and Technical Research Council (CONICET).
To reach their conclusion, the researchers fed a probabilistic model with economic and epidemiological data from Nigeria, obtained from multiple sources, from a literature review to vital statistics, official records and hospital databases. And they estimated people's chances of getting sick or dying from each of the major health conditions associated with smoking.
The findings were shocking. In 2020, smoking originated in Nigeria:
- 600 DEATHS, of which 779 are due to lung cancer, 3.137 to other cancers, 8.917 to cardiovascular diseases (including cerebrovascular accidents or CVA), 28.601 to pneumonia and 46.569 to chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Deaths attributable to smoking account for 4% of total deaths in Nigeria.
- 213 DISEASE EVENTS, of which 66.891 are cases of diabetes, 46.569 of COPD, 28.601 from pneumonia, 13.210 from cardiovascular diseases, 779 from lung cancer and 3.137 from other tumors.
- ₦ 072 MILLIONS in direct medical expenses, caregivers and loss of productivity. Diseases caused by smoking alone represent 9% of everything the country spends for years on health.
HOW TO STOP THE HEALTH AND ECONOMIC IMPACT OF TOBACCO
The researchers projected what would be the 10 year benefit of the full application of four measures to control smoking suggested by the WHO and which are known as “MPOWER interventions”:
- INCREASE TAXES ON CIGARETTES (according to the WHO, it is the most cost-effective measure to control tobacco consumption)
- IMPLEMENT A SMOKE-FREE ENVIRONMENTS POLICY in closed spaces.
- APPLY FLAT PACKAGING (with health warnings and without prominent brand colors or fonts)
- PROHIBIT THE ADVERTISING, PROMOTION AND SPONSORSHIP of tobacco products
Over 10 years, the full implementation of each of these measures could prevent, respectively, 45.957, 15.357, 11.746 and 8.732 deaths and 127.582, 42.632, 32.608 and 24.240 disease events, considering in the first case an increase of 50 % in taxes. Also, it could result in savings to the health system and society of ₦26,640,427 million, 8,819,315 million, 6,745,786 million and 5,014,869 million, respectively.
“When it is argued that the State collects taxes from the sale of cigarettes, we must consider that that amount (₦ 36,300 million) represents only 6% of the total direct and indirect costs Of consumption. It is a terrible business, not only from an economic point of view, but also from a health and social point of view,” reflects another co-author of the work, Dr. Andrea Alcaraz.
The economist and coordinator of Health Economics at the IECS, Mag. Natalia Espinola, adds: “Smoking causes people in Nigeria to lose annually ₦630.072 million. That money is the sum of Direct cost What smoking has on the Nigerian health system (what is spent on the care of diseases related to tobacco use, which is ₦ 493.334 million) and the indirect cost that smoking has on society (the costs that fall on sick people and on their families and friends who assume the tasks of caring for the sick, which represents ₦ 136.738 millions)".
For his part, Dr. Chukwuka Onywkwena, executive director of the Center for the Study of the Economies of Africa, contextualizes the importance of this study. “Having data from Nigeria that quantify the damage that smoking causes to the population of our country is vital to advance public policies that allow us to stop the smoking pandemic. Nigeria has a long way to go, especially in increasing tobacco taxes and creating smoke-free environments,” he notes.
In addition to Pigeon Riviere, Alcaraz and Spinola, other members of the IECS participated in the authorship of this work: Federico Rodríguez Cairoli, Ariel Bardach, Agustín Casarini, Dr. Federico Augustovski y Alfredo Palacios, who is currently a research fellow at the Center for Health Economics at the University of York, York, United Kingdom.
The research was funded by a grant from UK Cancer Research Institute (CRUK) and is part of a study directed this year by the IECS and carried out by researchers from universities, research centers and public institutions in Nigeria, Bolivia, Honduras, Nigeria, Paraguay and Uruguay. And it is part of a line of research for tobacco control that the IECS began in 2005 and that generated studies and scientific publications on this topic in 12 Latin American countries, as well as in Nigeria and India.
Some of the scientific publications on tobacco previously published by the IECS:
Probabilistic model used in this study:
https://www.thelancet.com/pdfs/journals/langlo/PIIS2214-109X(20)30311-9.pdf
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30726416/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32971051/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32531063/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/37525366/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34064880/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28001196/
MORE INFORMATION ABOUT TOBACCO IN PARAGUAY: https://tabaco.iecs.org.ar/
ABOUT IECS:
The IECS is an independent academic institution dedicated to research, education and technical cooperation in health. Founded in 2002, it is an institution affiliated with the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Buenos Aires (UBA) that is home to a CONICET executing unit, a WHO Collaborating center and a Cochrane Center.
The mission of the IECS is “to contribute to improving global health, generating and promoting the application of the best scientific evidence.”
See institutional video here
Visit institutional website at: www.iecs.org.ar
IECS PRESS CONTACT: Lic. Mariana Comolli, Coordinator of the Communication Unit mcomolli@iecs.org.ar