The Knesset Economics Committee today approved administrative orders aimed to reducing smoking issued by the Ministries of Health and Industry, Trade and Labor. The approval of the orders was made possible after the ministries acceded to a request by Economics Committee chairman MK Shalom Simhon (Labor), and reached an agreement with cigarette importers on the new wording about the dangers of smoking to be printed on cigarette packs.
The Economics Committee approve 12 warnings Hebrew and Arabic drafted by the Ministry of Health, each of which will cover 30% of the pack's surfaces. The different warnings will be equally divided among packs of each brand.
The approved warnings include "Cigarettes damage your physical stamina"; "Smoking causes early aging of the face"; "Each cigarette puts 43 carcinogens into your body"; "Cigarettes cause strokes, heart disease, and impotence"; "Smoking causes 85% of lung cancer cases"; "Smokers account for 75% of heart attacks among people under 45"; "Smoking during pregnancy threatens your fetus"; and "Smoking harms your children's health".
The Economics Committee also approved a revised administrative order to protect consumers that bans the use of phrases like "light" and "ultra-light" on cigarettes, phrases which imply that certain cigarettes are less harmful than other tobacco products.
The Minister of Health will publish the order on April 1, and it will come into effect eight months later.
Published by Globes [online] - www.globes.co.il - on January 6, 2004