Daijiworld News Network - Goa
(In an exclusive interview to daijiworld.com's special correspondent Ares in Panaji, Dr Shekhar Salkar, general secretary of the National Organization for Tobacco Eradication speaks on tobacco use and its ill effects.)
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Dr Shekhar Salkar
1. What is the status of Cancer in Goa? Where do we figure on the national scene?
About 1,500 new cancer cases occur in Goa per year. Out of these, about one third are that of oral cancer. Most of these oral cancer cases that come to hospitals/clinics in Goa are seen in younger persons mostly addicted to gutkha or other tobacco chewing products, which are at an early stage of development and can be treated in a reasonably satisfactory way.
2. Is a ban on tobacco products really implemented in Goa or some people managed to clandestinely sell the product?
We agree that total implementation of the ban on Gutkha is not enforced. Considering the resources at the disposal of the enforcing authority, namely the State FDA, we would say that they have done very satisfactory work towards enforcing the ban on Gutkha. Regarding other tobacco products like cigarettes, bidis etc., the existing laws do not ban the products but restrict their use in public places and sale to minors. The important thing that is achieved by this ban is that Guthka is not freely available in the local market and therefore children and others who were not addicted to these products are unlikely to buy these products. Those dealers who still sell these products do so clandestinely only to those persons who used to buy them before the ban.
Comparing the implementation of the Gutkha ban with that of the ban on smoking and spitting in public places, we note that almost no enforcement of the smoking and spitting ban is done for the last twelve months.
3. What is the national percentage of students into tobacco consumption?
The sample survey of school children of Goa done in year 2000 as part of Global Youth Tobacco Survey (GYTS) of Tobacco Free Initiative found that about 5% of the school children were using tobacco in some form. In the various states of the country, the percentage of children using tobacco ranged from 4% to 63%. The rates were the highest in the north eastern states.
4. What are the NOTE activities in Goa?
NOTE-India is operating a Tobacco Cessation Clinic at Panaji where tobacco-users wishing to give up their tobacco use are provided free treatment including counselling and medication. NOTE-India is also carrying out tobacco cessation programmes in community set-up wherein the tobacco-users are provided counseling for quitting tobacco use at their homes by trained medico-social workers and field workers. These programmes were held at Chimbel and Usgaon. Anganwadi workers of Bicholim Taluka were provided training to spread knowedge on effects of tobacco use to men and women in their anganwadi areas. Also NSS students of colleges were given similar training for spreading education in the villages. Lectures and audio-visual programmes are held in high schools and colleges in order that the students do not take up tobacco use.
5. Do we need more stringent legislation to curb tobacco usage?
We feel that the existing laws on tobacco control are quite adequate, and enforcing more stringent laws is not the need of the hour. The problem is that there is no adequate machinery to enforce the laws and the bureaucracy needs sensitization on the existing laws. A strong political will definitely help in proper enforcement of the laws.
There are of course some loopholes. For example, we cannot expect the police and revenue officers to visit and verify that the public places are smoke-free at all times. The responsibility for maintaining smoke-free norm should be vested in the persons in charge of the establishments, like headmasters of high schools, managers of hotels and restaurants etc.
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