Tobacco and Public Health - TCSC Indonesia

RUTH ROEMER 683
advertising and advertising related to minors. It also invalidated unattributed health
warnings and the ban on tobacco trademarks on non-tobacco goods.
The response of the government of Canada was prompt and strong. Three months
later, in 1995, the Minister of Health issued a report outlining the legislative directions
that the federal government proposed to take (Marleau 1995).
In the years between 1989 when the Tobacco Products Control Act, C-51, took effect
and 1995, when the Canadian Supreme Court struck down major portions of the Act,
many actions occurred to strengthen tobacco control, including stronger rotating
warnings, a ban on smoking in the federal public service, a requirement for smoke-free
flights on Canadian carriers, local ordinances restricting smoking in public places and
workplaces, and substantial tax increases (an increase of US $4 a carton in 1987 and US
$6 a carton in 1991).
The tax increases were followed by smuggling of Canadian cigarettes into the United
States and back into Canada through a reservation of Native Americans that straddled
both countries, among other means. Thus, the Canadian tax was not paid, and the
cigarettes sold for US $2.50 per pack instead of US $4.50 per pack. Despite efforts by
health groups to urge an export tax to control smuggling, the federal and five provincial
governments elected to reduce tobacco taxes—an action that led to an increase in
smoking among young people (Cunningham 1996).
On April 25, 1997, the Canadian Parliament adopted a new tobacco control law—
Bill C-71, an Act to Regulate the Manufacture, Sale, Labeling, and Promotion of Tobacco
Products. The Act gives sweeping powers to the government to regulate the contents of
tobacco products, bans sales to persons under 18, requires posting of signs by retailers
that the sale or giving of tobacco products to persons under 18 is illegal, prohibits sale of
cigarettes in packages other than packages of 20, prohibits sales from vending machines,
mandates health warnings and authorizes package inserts about the health hazards of
tobacco, prohibits tobacco advertising except for product information and brand preference
advertising that is not lifestyle, misleading, or appealing to persons under 18,
prohibits the distribution and promotion of tobacco products if any brand elements
appear on a non-tobacco product associated with youth or lifestyle, and restricts sponsorship
until October 2003 when all sponsorship advertising is prohibited.
In 2000, Canada strengthened its tobacco control legislation further. It requires one
of 16 strong, large, picture-based rotated warnings on the top 50 per cent of the front
and back of cigarette packages. Inside the package one of the 16 rotated warnings is
required either on an insert or on the ‘slide’ of ‘slide and shell’ packages. Nine of the
16 messages provide advice on quitting, and seven provide detailed health information.
In 2002, Canada pioneered another innovation. It launched an attack on deceptive
descriptors of tobacco products. Exposing the deception in promotion of ‘light’ and
‘mild’ cigarettes, the Ministerial Council on Tobacco Control recommended to the
Canadian Minister of Health that a complete ban be placed on these misleading
descriptors and others that may also be misleading. This ban should be promulgated