Authorities in the Ministry of Health and population have raised a concern with the continued resources government is spending in addressing smoking attributed disease.
The remarks were ade in Lilongwe during the launch of 2018 report called No Fire, No Smoke: The Global State of Tobacco Harm Reduction in Malawi.
Addressing the audience during the launch, Chief Director of health services in the Ministry of Health and Population, Charles Mwansambo revealed that government is aware that smoking in the country is bringing a great harm to the individuals and to the nation as a whole.
However, Mwansambo was upbeat that the policies government is intending to implement are going to drastically help in apprehending the situation.
According to Mwansambo, the country is allocating a lot funds to dealing with the smoking related disease a development he described a hiccup to the progress of the country’s economy.
“Smoking is harmful to human health and we have ended up losing a lot of money in treating the effect of smoking. And as a country it is high time that we have to found another means or crop that will as tobacco generate us a foreign currency,” said Mwansambo.
And commenting on the development professor, Gerry Stimson, Knowledge Action Change- UK has tipped Malawi government to opt for e- cigarettes that is proven to have a low chances of causing harm to a human health.
Gerry further pleaded with the country that stopping smoking will never cause damage to the tobacco production the country’s which is said to be a major source of the country’s forex.
Malawi is not signatory to Framework Convention Tobacco Control-FCTC a development that has worried various international stakeholders that are leading the battle fighting against smoking globally.
And despite this, Malawi registers over 5000 people who die of smoking attributed disease per annum.
