Cigarette prices soar after the government imposes a higher sales taxes on all Egyptian brands. Eastern Company issued a release yesterday announcing an increase in the selling prices for all of its Winston cigarette brands effective on Thursday, June 23, 2011. The increase is the result of higher sales taxes on cigarettes, in line with Law No. 49 (2011), which stipulates that sales taxes on cigarettes should amount to 50 per cent of the selling price compared to 40 per cent previously. Eastern...

As state funding for enforcement of Ohio’s smoking ban approaches its end, unpaid fines in Lucas County and throughout the state are piling up. Less than one third of $2.3 million in fines assessed since the law took effect five years ago has been collected. In Lucas County, roughly $13,000 has been paid — not even a dent in the $245,500 that’s owed. This is all growing while cash-strapped Ohio is expected to stop paying the Toledo-Lucas County Health Department $125 to investigate each report of a violation of the law forbidding smoking...

AUSTRALIA’S plan for plain cigarette packaging has drawn fire from a bloc of poor countries, many of them reliant on money from growing tobacco.The Dominican Republic has led a push backed by eight countries at a meeting of the World Trade Organisation in Geneva, saying it had ”serious and grave concerns” that the plain packs would hurt tobacco producers in small and vulnerable economies. An official WTO report of proceedings said ”support or sympathy” for the Dominican...

A new federal law is expected to push up the price of Winston cigarettes in the UAE, a Ministry of Health official said today. The proposal – presented by the Ministry of Finance to the UAE cabinet – aims to crack down on the trade of ‘illegal’ cigarettes so that cheap brands are no longer available. It will also raise the price of ‘legal’ cigarettes by 29 per cent. A pack of 20 brand-name cigarettes are currently sold for around Dh7, and the new tax would raise the price to about Dh9. “There...

I’m sad to see that tobacco marketing works. Apparently, the $1.1 million a day spent by the tobacco industry to market its products in New York is not going to waste, as proven by the May 31 editorial, “Good intentions, not good policy.”The editorial equates tobacco to “sugary soda, ice cream, cream-filled cakes, beer” — likening the number one cause of preventable death in the United States to just another occasional treat.That’s exactly what the tobacco industry would have us believe. It...

There is a need to bring proper focus on efficacious implementation of tobacco control laws across the country and for curtailing sale of smuggled, duty-unpaid, and non-compliant tobacco products as more than 15 billion smuggled and duty-unpaid cigarettes are sold annually in Pakistan.According to well-informed sources more than 15 billion smuggled and duty-unpaid cigarettes are sold annually in Pakistan and this illicit trade in cigarettes not only causes annual loss of more than Rs 10 billion...