Issue: Jamaica not conforming to tobacco-control rules

THE EDITOR, Sir:

The Government of Jamaica should withdraw from the World Health Organisation's Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, or the convention should ask them to withdraw.

It has never and will never conform to its guidelines. Eye-catching advertising signs can still be seen along roadways promoting tobacco smoking.

Don't bother to write to the Ministry of Health about this. No answer at all. So what to do? Just know Jamaica is caught in the trap of the gifts of the cigarette company in Jamaica and we are reversing as a Third-World country in this regard. Jamaica is also thinking strongly about the poor farmers planting tobacco for the cigarette company.

As cigarette smoking is pushed out of the developing world, the Third World is being tricked by cigarette companies' gifts. Recently, The Smokefree Action Coalition took a poll of how people felt about the first smoke-free square in Spanish Town - which still stands ungazetted by the Government of Jamaica - and it was surprising to see how many people are proud of that square but shocked to see that it was 'impotent'. That means you cannot enforce the law on the smoke-free square in Spanish Town.

What is the head of the Anti-Smoking Unit doing at the Ministry of Health? You tell me.

ROSEMARIE GREENE

pntwncitizensagv@cwjamaica.com

The Smokefree Action Coalition