Kenya has received a boost in its efforts to control tobacco use. WHO boss Dr Tedros Adhanon said the government must use the strongest measures possible to protect citizens from tobacco use. “Governments face a moral and legal imperative to use the strongest possible measures to protect their citizens from tobacco,” he said in a statement. Tedros accused tobacco firms of consistently lying about how much damage their products cause.Kenya banned shisha last week in its efforts to stop health problems caused by tobacco smoke. Health CS Cleopa Mailu said this was one of the measures to help the country achieve universal health coverage by 2021.
Kenya Tobacco Control Alliance, an umbrella of local lobbies, said the country has good tobacco control legislation but proper enforcement is lacking. “There is a lot of interference from tobacco companies.
They always seek to delay and sabotage the law,” Joel Gitali, theKetca chairman, said. The law bans cigarette firms in Kenya from advertising their products or using misleading words like “menthol”, and “light”. Recently, tobacco firms in the US were forced to run advertisements to apologise for misleading the public using such tags.
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