Tallying tobacco

The proposed tobacco control law being mulled by the Lebanese Parliamentary Administration and Justice Committee has stirred debate between health-minded civil society activists, lobbyists from the tobacco and advertising industries keen to protect their commercial interests and a public skeptical of how serious the government is about enforcing any real tobacco control policy. Arguments have covered not only health concerns but also Lebanon’s economy, asking whether or not the country can afford to lose the cash raised by the tobacco industry, specifically in the agricultural, hospitality and advertising sectors. The controversial legislation would be surprisingly strict compared to the current law, calling for a ban on smoking in indoor public places including bars and restaurants, forbidding advertising of all tobacco-related products and insisting on pictorial warning labels on cigarette packs equivalent to 40 percent of the packaging size. Proposed as a series of amendments to a draft law from 2006,