Call to end tobacco profits from child sales

Companies pocket over $1m pa as 269,000 schoolkids light up 

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ASH Australia is challenging the tobacco industry and governments to end the industry’s long history of profiting from tobacco sales to children, following the release of the latest national survey showing 269,000 secondary students are smoking.

The survey, released yesterday by the Centre for Behavioural Research in Cancer, warns that half of the 269,000 children will become long-term addicts and half of those will die prematurely losing many years of productive life.

A third of the underage smokers are supplied illegally by retailers.

“Tobacco companies are raking in an est. AUD$25m a year from illegal tobacco sales and pocketing a cool $1.14m profit from these sales”, says Anne Jones, CEO of ASH.

“It’s like ‘groundhog day’ every year’” she says, “with tens of thousands of kids joining the ranks of smokers and no accountability by the tobacco industry  - despite their protests that they don’t want kids to smoke.”

ASH is calling upon:

·        the tobacco companies to hand over as a minimum their profits from kids to help fund an independent anti-smoking campaign; and

·        governments to use their powers to make the tobacco industry accountable for their defective products and years of cover-up over targeting children and promoting products they knew were both lethal and addictive.

“This survey is a tragic snap-shot of the health of school children and governments could act now to help end the cycle of addiction that commences with minors and ends in disability and early death,” says Anne Jones.

Comment:  Anne Jones   ph.  (02) 9334-1876  

                                         or  (m) 0417-227-879

Media inquiries:     Stafford Sanders     ph. (02) 9334-1823

Page last updated on 17/4/2002