Tobacco causes unpredictable harm to health and economy.
(Baonghean.vn) - Every year, Vietnam has about 40,000 people die from tobacco-related diseases and this number could increase to 70,000 people/year by 2030.
40,000 Vietnamese people die/year due to tobacco
According to statistics from the World Health Organization, cigarette smoke contains about 7,000 chemicals, of which 70 are carcinogenic. Every cigarette smoked takes away 5.5 seconds of your life. The average life expectancy of a smoker is 5-8 years shorter than that of a non-smoker.
When smoking, cigarette smoke passes through the lungs into the blood, accumulating over time to become the condition and cause of many diseases such as: chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, aortic aneurysm, esophageal - laryngeal cancer... Tobacco causes 25 different diseases, but in general, tobacco causes 90% of lung cancer cases, 75% of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease cases and 25% of ischemic heart disease cases.
Tobacco smoke can remain in the air even when it can no longer be seen or smelled. Non-smokers who inhale tobacco smoke (passive smokers) are affected in the same way as direct smokers. Just like smokers, passive smokers are at risk of the same diseases as smokers: cancer, stroke, respiratory and cardiovascular diseases.
In particular, people who inhale secondhand smoke are 10 times more likely to get sick than smokers. Every year, Vietnam has about 40,000 people die from tobacco-related diseases and this number could increase to 70,000 people/year by 2030.
Cause great economic loss
Currently, Vietnam is among the 15 countries with the highest number of smokers in the world. According to the global survey on tobacco use among adults, Vietnam has about 15.6 million smokers. The smoking rate among men is 47%, on average 1 in 2 men smoke; 2/3 of women and children regularly inhale cigarette smoke... The high rate of smoking has caused great harm to the health and economy of the country.
On average, each year, a smoker in Vietnam has to spend nearly 700,000 VND. With 15.6 million smokers, each year there is about more than 8,400 billion VND spent on this item. According to the results of a recent survey, spending on cigarettes in our country is 3.6 times higher than the cost of education, 2.5 times higher than the spending on clothing and nearly double the spending on medical examination and treatment. In addition, diseases caused by cigarettes increase the economic burden on each family and cause a loss of labor force.
The high consumption of cigarettes leads to smuggling, causing losses to the state budget. According to statistics from the Vietnam Tobacco Association, smuggled cigarettes currently account for 25% of the cigarette market share in Vietnam; causing a loss of more than 200 million USD and thousands of billions of VND in tax revenue.
In addition to the loss due to cigarette spending, the total cost of treatment and loss due to loss of working capacity due to illness and premature death for five groups of diseases (lung cancer, upper respiratory tract cancer, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, myocardial infarction, stroke) caused by smoking is more than 23 trillion VND a year. The losses that Vietnam has not calculated due to tobacco use include the cost of treating other diseases caused by tobacco.
Because of the unpredictable harmful effects of tobacco on health and the huge economic losses, each individual and community should quit smoking./.
