Honorable Minister of Health,
Thank you very much for dedicating the time to participate in this event amidst the COVID-19 response. We know that these are extremely demanding times for you.
First of all, I would like congratulate Suriname for having been selected as one of the FCTC2030 countries. Many countries applied but only those that demonstrated a serious commitment in moving forward in fighting the tobacco epidemic were selected.
And in fact, we talk about tobacco as a global epidemic because tobacco use, in all its forms, kills more than 8 million people every year, 80% of these deaths occurring in low- and middle-income countries. It is estimated that half of all smokers will die of tobacco related diseases at a premature age.
Apart from the well-known health consequences of tobacco use, tobacco use impoverishes families and costs the world economy over a trillion dollars annually in medical expenses and lost productivity and has a devastating effect on the environment. It has a clear negative effect on development, and we will hear about this later.
Excellency, this is a human caused epidemic due to the ruthless greed of the tobacco industry that will do everything in their hands to make vast profits from making people dependent to nicotine and will invent new forms every day.
In order to confront this common enemy, the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control was adopted by all WHO Member States, in 2003 and entered into force in 2005. This is an evidence-based legally binding treaty that governments, as a whole, have the obligation to implement so that together we can accelerate tobacco control to improve the lives of our citizens and ensure a better future of all countries. As of now, 182 Parties including the European Union are Parties to the Convention. The implementation of the WHO FCTC is also an integral part of the SDG agenda, included as Target 3.a under the Goal 3 on health and wellbeing.
Suriname became a Party to the WHO FCTC in 2008 and since then has made great progress in tobacco control. Suriname approved a very comprehensive tobacco control law in 2013 and has made progress in other areas such as tobacco taxation and packaging and labelling of tobacco products. We now need to ensure that the law is properly enforced, taxes continue to increase, health warnings increase in size or we can even consider plain packaging. It is also important to ensure good governance, a multisectoral approach, an agreed strategy and costed work plans so as to ensure that efforts are sustained in time. Under Article 15 of the WHO FCTC a second treaty, the Protocol to Eliminate Illicit Trade on Tobacco Products has been adopted. It now has 61 Parties and I hope Suriname will join it in the near future.
We have been hit by the devastating COVID-19 epidemic, but let’s use this opportunity to promote tobacco control. There is evidence that the outcome of the disease can be worse for people that use tobacco. It is a good moment to quit tobacco use and also to include tobacco tax and price policies to in the recovery plans to build back better.
I am confident that despite the difficult times, Suriname will manage to make the best out of the FCTC 2030 project and will make a change, in improving the health and wellbeing of the people of Suriname.
Your Excellency, please be assured that the Convention Secretariat together with WHO and UNDP will fully support Suriname in this endeavor.
Thank you very much and congratulations again for a successful launch.