Smokefree amendment bill could see Māori mortality rates slashed
Tuesday, 26 July 2022
The life expectancy of Māori women would drastically increase if the smokefree amendment bill is passed into law, modellers say.
It would also make it illegal for anyone born after 2009 to buy tobacco products.
The Smokefree Environments and Regulated Products (Smoked Tobacco) Amendment Bill which was introduced to parliament by Associate Health Minister Hon Dr Ayesha Verrall, passed its first reading on Tuesday.
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The Bill introduces three key measures from the Smokefree Aotearoa 2025 Action Plan: denicotinising all smoked tobacco products; greatly reducing the number of tobacco retail outlets; and introducing a smokefree generation, creating a cohort of young people born on or after 1 January 2009 that may never legally be sold tobacco products.
Ministry of Health data shows smoking rates have decreased for all ethnic groups but large differences remain. Māori adults were almost three times as likely as non-Māori adults to smoke. Figures show smoking rates for Māori and Pasifika are higher sitting at 22.3% and 16.4% respectively. While 8% of European/other and 3.9% of Asian smoked.
The bill relies on the modelling by the University of Otago’s ASPIRE 2025 Research Centre, which carried out research to support the Smokefree 2025 goal.
ASPIRE 2025 were commissioned to provide research to the Government on the potential health and cost impacts of the Smokefree Aotearoa 2025 Action Plan. It underpins the Regulatory Impact Statement considered by Cabinet in early 2022.
One of the most startling findings was the reduction in Māori/non-Māori health inequalities.
The research found that if the bill was passed the death gap, for 45+ year olds, was reduced by a staggering 22.9% for Māori females compared to non-Māori females, and a still very large 9.6% for males.
Co-director of ASPIRE 2025 Andrew Waa (Ngāti Hine, Ngāpuhi) commends the Bill for placing Te Tiriti o Waitangi at its heart.
“The Bill continues work begun by Māori leaders, who first proposed a tupeka kore (tobacco free) vision, and the Māori Affairs Select Committee, which recommended introducing a Smokefree Aotearoa goal.”
The Bill outlines three transformative and world-leading measures that will bring profound public health benefits, he said.
Professor Tony Blakely an epidemiologist, public health medicine specialist and researcher for ASPIRE2025, said for maori communities this body of research is huge.
“We see a nearly 22.7 percent decrease in the death rate gap between Māori and non Māori,” he said
“That is, sorry im going to swear: f…… amazing. I've done a lot of this modelling, (and) I've not seen anything that gets within that reduction in health inequality, this is not a silver bullet, but this is a big one.”
Blakely said this is an opportunity to improve health for health’s sake, and the spin-off economically will be evident in the not to distant future.
“Yes there will be a loss to the government in tax revenue from tobacco in the first 5 to 10 years, but there will be a transition to saving on expenditure on health care once these things roll through,” he said.
“Once that time lag of lung disease heart disease roll through, after about 5/10 years there will be a net gain on the bottom line form the nz government because they will be spending less on health services and gaining more in tax revenue.”
Professor Richard Edwards, also an ASPIRE 2025 Co-director, says that denicotinisation will make Tobacco products non-addictive.
“Research studies show people who use denicotinised cigarettes smoke less, are exposed to fewer toxins, and are more likely to quit and become smokefree. Denicotinised cigarettes will mean young people who experiment with smoking are much less likely to become addicted to nicotine.
“We see denicotinisation as a powerful measure that will help free thousands of people who smoke from a toxic addiction; it will also protect future generations from smoking-related cancers and other diseases.”
Professor Janet Hoek, who also co-directs the ASPIRE 2025 Research Centre, says proposals to reduce the number of stores selling tobacco is that right move.
“Tobacco is the only product that kills people when used as intended. It’s time to recognise tobacco is not a normal consumer product and should not be sold alongside milk, bread and other staple items,” she said.
Hoek said putting the health of future generations at the heart of the bill will stop unnecessary deaths.
“No one starts smoking because they want to become addicted to a product that will kill them prematurely. Young people deserve freedom from addiction and the smokefree generation is an important step in giving them just that.”
Waa said that since Māori leaders first called for a tupeka kore goal, more than 50,000 people have died from smoking.
“It’s time to eliminate the terrible burden that tobacco use inflicts, and the great harm it causes to Māori and Pacific peoples.”
Figures from the Ministry of Health show around 5000 people die each year in New Zealand because of smoking or second-hand smoke exposure. That’s 13 people a day.
And while smoking is on the decline, the decrease over the last year was larger than usual. From 2019/20 to 2020/21, current smoking declined from 13.7% to 10.9% and daily smoking declined from 11.9% to 9.4%.