Iceland considers prescription-only cigarettes
Tobacco bill proposes outlawing shop sales, with only doctors allowed to prescribe cigarettes to addicts unable to kick habit.
Monday 4 July 2011 12.35 BST
Iceland is considering banning the shop sale of cigarettes to help society 'wake up' to the dangers of smoking. Photograph: Alamy
Iceland is considering banning the sale of cigarettes and making them a prescription-only product.
The parliament in Reykjavik is to debate a proposal that would outlaw the sale of cigarettes in normal shops. Only pharmacies would be allowed to dispense them – initially to those aged 20 and up, and eventually only to those with a valid medical certificate.
The radical initiative is part of a 10-year plan that also aims to ban
smoking in all public places, including pavements and parks, and in cars where children are present. Iceland also wants to follow Australia's lead by
forcing tobacco manufacturers to sell cigarettes in plain, brown packaging plastered with health warnings rather than branding.
Under the mooted law, doctors will be encouraged to help addicts kick the habit with treatments and education programmes. If these do not work, they may prescribe cigarettes.
The private member's bill is sponsored by former health minister Siv Fridleifsdottir, who worked with the Icelandic Medical Association as well as a coalition of anti-tobacco groups to come up with the proposal. "The aim is to protect children and youngsters and stop them from starting to smoke," she said on Monday. The proposal would initially result in an increase in cigarette prices, said Fridleifsdottir, of "10% per year, in line with World Health Organisation proposals – evidence shows that a 10% increase results in a 4-8% reduction in consumption".
But by the end of the 10-year plan, prescription-only cigarettes should actually be cheaper than ever, according to Thorarinn Gudnason, president of the Icelandic Society of Cardiology, who helped draw up the proposal.
"Under our plan, smokers who are given prescriptions will be diagnosed as addicts, and we don't think the government should tax addicts."
Gudnason said current cigarette pricing in Iceland did not take into account the huge costs imposed on society by smokers. "A packet currently costs around 1,000 krona [£5.50], but if you factor in the cost of sick leave, reduced productivity due to smoking breaks and premature retirement on health grounds, it should really be 3,000 krona," he said.
The tobacco proposal also says that nicotine should be classed as an addictive substance. "It's as hard to give up nicotine as heroin, not in terms of the side effects, but in terms of the cravings and how quickly one becomes addicted," said Gudnason.
"We also want the government to license cigarettes like a medicine, which would mean they would have to go through the same rigorous trials as any other drug. I doubt cigarettes would ever get on the market now that we know the side-effects – lung cancer, heart attacks, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease."
Gudnason said 300 out of the 1,500 deaths in Iceland each year were caused by one of those three conditions.
"That's 20% of all deaths. We think that our proposals could lead to a significant reduction in smoking-related deaths – perhaps down to just 100 annually."
The proposal also suggests that tobacco smoke should be treated as a carcinogenic substance, and that it should be restricted in a similar way to other known carcinogens, because of the known effects of passive smoking.