The health chief appears to have backtracked from an earlier promise to clamp down harder on tobacco.
Mary Ann Benitez
Thursday, August 16, 2012
The health chief appears to have backtracked from an earlier promise to clamp down harder on tobacco.
There were high hopes that, under Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying and health minister Ko Wing-man, Hong Kong could follow Australia in banning “mini-billboard advertising” by imposing plain cigarette packaging.
Canberra won its battle against Big Tobacco yesterday when the High Court of Australia ruled that forcing cigarettes and tobacco products to be sold in drab green uniform packaging with graphic health warnings from December 1 this year does not contravene the country’s constitution.
Asked by The Standard whether Hong Kong would follow suit, a spokesman for the Food and Health Bureau said the government is committed to control tobacco use “in accordance with the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control.”
She added: “We will continue to monitor the situation and review our measures with a view to protecting public health in Hong Kong. We do not have any concrete proposal for new measures at this juncture.”
In June, before he was officially appointed as secretary for food and health by Leung, Ko told The Standard: “As a doctor and as chairman of the Hong Kong Anti-Cancer Society, I would support any initiative to help eliminate tobacco.”
At least 20 countries have introduced plain packaging but have been challenged in the courts.
Hong Kong-based Philip Morris Asia has already launched a lawsuit in Hong Kong alleging the law on plain packaging breached Australia’s bilateral investment treaty with the territory.