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RYOs cost less than $4 per day, compared with $8.00 for factory-made (FM)
cigarettes, (at 17 cigs/day.8)
Smoking is reducing very slowly. The proportion of all smokers who had quit has stayed
the same (22%) from 1996 to 2006. Current smokers decreased (24% to
21%)- due to fewer young people having taken up smoking.3
Popularity
·
Maori prefer hand-rolled (RYOs): 66%
of Maori smokers used RYOs, 47% exclusively in 2002.1
·
Teenagers prefer RYOs: 73%
of 15-19 year old smokers use RYOs, 56% exclusively.2
·
Any RYO
use (48%) now exceeds any FM use (47% of smokers). RYO dominates in
under-40 age groups, in males (49%) and in Maori (60% of smokers).2
·
RYOs are smoked by 370,000,
and exclusively by 270,000 out of 654,000 adult NZ smokers.2.4
·
Of smokers, 66% use RYOs and
41% use them exclusively,2 (UK
29%, 12%) 5
·
RYO cigarettes constitute a slowly increasing
31% of all tobacco smoked in New Zealand6, higher than any other OECD country except Norway.
·
Assuming each RYO contains
0.5 g tobacco, and a manufactured cigarette 0.73 g,6 then
RYOs account for 40% of all cigarettes smoked.
Health consequences
·
RYO deaths As risk depends on smoke
inhaled, and if RYO and FM smokers inhale the same smoke volumes then
RYOs may account for 1800 out of 4500 premature cigarette deaths
annually in NZ.
·
Maori RYO
deaths A third of Maori deaths have been
attributed to smoking,6 and RYOs may account for one- sixth
or more of all Maori deaths.
·
RYO addiction RYOs are smoked more intensively per gram of
tobacco, as the addiction score is the same for RYO and FMs.8
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Research and Policy
Lack of
research. RYOs have received surprisingly little
research or policy attention, even though RYOs are often smoked
unfiltered and their design and the paper used is different2
US Library of Congress database lists only 37 abstracts for
“hand-rolled cigarettes”, 8 for “roll-your own
cigarettes”, 2 for “hand-rolling cigarettes”.
Lack of research on relative harm RYO
smokers in US, Australia Canada and UK are
twice as likely to believe RYOs pose less risk compared with FMs5
– perhaps because they contain less tobacco. Rather the question
is, “Do RYO smokers inhale
any less smoke?” Research information is lacking.
Lack of research on tax effects given cheap RYOs. Tax on RYOs needs to double before any overall tax increase can reduce overall
smoking.
References
1 AC Nielsen
national smoking survey data calendar year 2002.
See www.endsmoking.org.nz/ryosalesban.htm
at Table 1.
2.Tobacco Trends Wellington: MoH 2006. www.moh.govt.nz
3 Laugesen
M. Duncanson M, Fraser T et al. Hand-rolling cigarette paper as the
reference point for regulating cigarette fire safety. Tobacco Control 2003; 12: 406-10
4 Laugesen
M. Census: Smoking prevalence down; fewer taking it up. SmokeLess NZ
e-News 14 Dec
2006
. Media release. www.endsmoking.org.nz/enews14Dec06.pdf
at Table 2.
5 D Young, R Borland, D Hammond, K M
Cummings, E Devlin, H-H Yong, R J O’Connnor for the ITC
Collaboration Prevalence and attributes of roll-your-own
smokers in the International Tobacco Control (ITC) Four Country Survey Tob.
Control, Jun 2006; 15: iii76 - iii82.
6 Laugesen M.
Analysis of Tobacco manufacturers returns to the Ministry of Health for
2005. www.ndp.govt.nz at Table
E1.
http://www.ndp.govt.nz/tobacco/tobaccoreturns/2005/tobacco-returns-2005-analysis-tables.xls
7 Laugesen M
Clements M Cigarette
Smoking Mortality among Māori 1954-2028. 1998.
Wellington: Te Puni Kōkiri. 1998. TPK.
8 Fraser T, McRobbie H et al. Evaluation of Smokestop an
internet based smoking cessation programme. Auckland
. www.endsmoking.org.nz/ryotax.htm
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