Smoking Epidemic in Africa Could Contribute to 8 Million Worldwide Deaths

by Mike Smith · 2009-12-24 09:12:00 UTC
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There are is no epidemic more easily preventable than smoking. And as it already kills 5.6 million people a year, especially hitting sub-Saharan Africa, now is the time to make a new years resolution to better monitor the threat and alert countries to the growing danger.

As we reported earlier this year, too much good work by global health professionals is blown away 'in a gust of smoke,' but developing nations are increasingly acting — quicker than developed nations did — to ban advertising and limiting government incentives.

An international monitoring effort called the Global Tobacco Surveillance System is working with the World Health Organization and nations in Africa to better guide tobacco prevention programs reports VOA News. U.S. corporations are often to blame, playing a big role in selling tobacco, but now through setting up wider partnerships the U.S. Centers for Disease Control is helping to save the lives of its people who are experiencing higher cancer rates. Women are ten times less likely to smoke than men, but aggressive marketing is further putting them under threat. The epidemic could rise to kill 8 million people a year over the next twenty years. We must work hard to save the 80 million lives at threat in the next decade.

Photo credit: Jentymom

Mike Smith
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