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By Katrice R. Jalbuena, Reporter
TO combat people’s previous conceptions of
smoking as glamorous, the Department of Health (DOH) wants pictographic
health warnings be printed on cigarette packs.
Health Undersecretary Alexander
Padilla recommends passing a law to require picture-based health
warnings to warn smokers of the harmful consequences of smoking on
cigarette packs.
In Canada, Thailand, and the
United Kingdom, pictorial health warnings on cigarette packs are in
use, instead of a mere text message that says “smoking is
hazardous to your health”.
Studies show that picture-based
warnings effectively decrease the youth’s urge to smoke, and
increases smokers’ tendency to quit.
Meanwhile, the advocacy group
Framework Convention on Tobacco Control Alliance, Philippines (FCAP)
has protested the granting of the Department of Trade and Industry
(DTI), through the Inter-Agency Committee on Tobacco (IACT), of an
extension for the tobacco industry to comply with the health warning
provision of the Tobacco Regulation Act or Republic Act 9211.
The DTI admitted this during a
recent Senate inquiry hearing set by the Committees on Health and
Trade on the status of the implementation of RA 9211 (Tobacco
Regulation Act of 2003).
FCAP president Dr. Encarnita
Blanco-Limpin said DTI Undersecretary Zenaida Maglaya and DTI
Director Victorio Mario Dimagiba told the Senate panel chaired by
Senator Pia Cayetano that the IACT extended the health warning
deadline from July 1, 2006 to November 1, 2006.
Section 13-c of the Tobacco
Regulation Act mandated all cigarette packs to bear prominent health
warnings beginning July 1, 2006.
The warnings are to take the form
of text statements stating any of these: GOVERNMENT WARNING:
Cigarettes are Addictive; GOVERNMENT WARNING: Tobacco can harm your
children; or GOVERNMENT WARNING: Smoking kills.
“This express declaration and
admission coming from no less than Undersecretary Maglaya, IACT
acting chair, comes as a complete shock to us after her repeated
denial in the past that no such extension was ever granted to the
tobacco industry,” Dr. Limpin said in her letter to Trade
Secretary Peter Favila.
She added that she had repeatedly
inquired through letters to the office of Director Dimagiba and
during IACT meetings if the IACT had agreed to the tobacco
industry’s request for an extension of the deadline. Her
inquiries, she said, “were met with consistent denials and evasive
comments meant to sidetrack [us] from the issue.”
The lung specialist said that she
and her colleagues were appalled to hear DTI representatives say
during the Senate hearing that the IACT had granted an extension to
the cigarette firms through a majority vote.
“There could never have been a
majority vote since the IACT has never been convened to discuss the
issue, and therefore could not have voted on the same,” she said.
Dr. Limpin further pointed out
that the July 1, 2006 deadline is mandated by law.
“Hence, an extension of this
deadline can only be done through the passage of a law amending the
same. If the executive branch unilaterally changes dates mandated by
law, they are vesting upon themselves legislative powers. Any act
performed by an agency beyond its powers is illegal.”
Senators Pia Cayetano and Mar
Roxas have declared the extension of the health warning deadline
from July 1, 2006 to November 1, 2006 to be an ultra vires (beyond
the power) act because such extension may be granted only through
legislative action. The lady senator pointed out that the IACT is an
executive agency which has no authority to unilaterally grant such
an extension.
Dr. Limpin called the Trade
Secretary’s attention to the fact that FCAP, as a member of IACT,
never gave its imprimatur to the unlawful extension.
She also urged the IACT to issue
an official statement declaring that it has no authority to extend
the deadline, and that the tobacco industry was guilty of violating
the law when it failed to comply with the health warning deadline
set on July 1, 2006.
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