'Flavoured tobacco ban would cut number of smokers'
A tobacco control advocate said on Friday that banning flavoured tobacco products would cut smoking, as many people are put off by the harsh taste of tobacco.  Dr Judith Mackay, director of Asian Consultancy on Tobacco Control, made the comment after Department of Health chief Ronald Lam said the government would consider such a ban after finding the smoking rate among females has remained unchanged at 3 to 4 percent over the last couple of decades. Over two-thirds of female smokers opt for menthol-flavoured products, the government said. Mackay said flavoured tobacco products don't differ too much from other tobacco products when it comes to health risks. "What they do differ on is acceptability because what the flavours do is to mask the very harsh flavours of tobacco, so things like menthol or even a whole range of different sort of sweetie-type flavours just make it more acceptable and easier to smoke them in a sense. If you remove the flavours from cigarettes, firstly there is a decrease in smoking," she said. "This has been shown around the world that smokers don't like smoking the harsh flavour of tobacco itself, so if you remove the flavours, there is a decrease in smoking. So I think the time has come to really introduce this measure into Hong Kong. It will reduce cigarette sales and smoking." Mackay also said that more public awareness is needed to bring down the rate of female smokers. "Try and close any loophole, any loophole at all in terms of advertising and promotion and sponsorship. We have to make the the cigarette less appealing. We have to do the health promotion, the health education specifically directed towards women," she said. "And, in fact, most of our health education has been rather general or certainly in the early days was more specifically directed towards men. So I think, you know, the time has come with the men's rates coming down but the women's rates stuck that we really do need to address women in order to achieve our target."