Global pact for no smoking in public

THE EDITOR: How many times have we taken a stroll through the streets of our famous capital, Port-of-Spain and environs and encounter the smoke exhaling from a cigarette smoker blowing in your face or stifling you in a room? And how many times are the laws of Trinidad and Tobago not implemented to cut off completely the smoking of tobacco in public. Oh! It is such a special report to hear that our country has signed the global pact to non-smoking in public. The World Health Organisation (WHO) has now made a no-nonsense step in eradicating public smoking worldwide.

Foreign Affairs Minister Knowlson Gift and Health Minister John Rahael have re-ignited in our minds the danger of smoking and the detrimental consequences to the lungs. The drastic measures setting in place, I am sure, were derived from cancer report findings and the global mortality rate which is very high. By trying to displace cigarettes off the grocery list, one wonders if this will put jobs in the tobacco manufacturing company at risk.

Gone are the days when advertisements displayed a goodlooking guy being hounded by an attractive girl for smoking whilst riding a motor bike. There are smokers when told to place an X-ray video camera direct to their lungs, what they see will scare the insides out of them. Smoking can be like a happy go lucky non-swimmer venturing into the deep waters of the sea and waiting until it’s too late to call for help. Smokers may say that a cigarette cools their brain but the pain is real when we cut the healthy lung story short.

GREGORY NEPTUNE
Port-of-Spain