SMOKING kills on average more than 72,000 people a year in Thailand, shortening their lives by about 18 years.

The alarming figures were highlighted at a press conference on World No Tobacco Day, which falls on May 31.

“Diseases associated with smoking such as lung cancer, emphysema, lung inflammation and tuberculosis are the main killers,” Dr Roengrudee Patanavanich, from Mahidol University’s Faculty of Medicine Ramathibodi Hospital, said.

She added that Thailand had 10.7 million smokers in 2017, of whom 72,565 succumbed to smoking-related diseases. On average, they lost about 18 years in terms of longevity.

The estimated cost of treatments, she pointed out, was about Bt77.62 billion a year.

The cost of lost income opportunities as a result of illnesses was Bt11.76 billion a year.

The financial cost of untimely deaths was estimated at Bt131 billion a year.

“In total, smoking has caused financial losses of about Bt220 billion a year,” Roengrudee said, emphasising the loss was much higher than the cigarette taxes that the government could collect.

She said cigarette tax revenue for the state was just about Bt68.6 billion.

Disease Control Department director-general Dr Suwannachai Wattanayingcharoenchai said cigarette smoke was dangerous not just for smokers but also for others.

“Just one inhalation of second-hand smoke brings hundreds of toxins into lungs,” he said.

Professor Dr Prakit Vathesatogkit, secretary-general of the Action on Smoking and Health Foundation Thailand, credited the late General Prem Tinsulanonda for initiating tobacco control in the country.

“In 1988, he assigned the Public Health Ministry to draw up a tobacco-control plan. Back then, there was no law to ban smoking but Prem banned smoking at Government House,” Prakit said.

He highlighted Prem’s contributions to tobacco control a day after Prem, who served as the prime minister between 1980 and 1988, passed away at the age of 98.

At the time of his passing, Prem was a statesman and president of the Privy Council.

Public Health Minister Dr Piyasakol Sakolsatayadorn said it was worrying that a significant number of children started smoking at the age of just 10. He said the government had lately introduced stricter measures to curb smoking in the country. For example, vehicles, offices and all public places are now declared smoke-free.

“At present, we have banned the sale of cigarettes to those younger than 20 years of age.

“We have also barred the sale of loose cigarettes, as well as the use of catch-lines and attractive designs on cigarette packets,” he said.

Piyasakol added that his ministry had implemented a project that required village health volunteers to encourage three locals in their area to quit smoking.

Counselling for addicts

“State hospitals under our ministry’s supervision have also provided counselling for those interested in giving up smoking.

“People can also easily call Hotline 1600 for advice on how to quit smoking,” he said.

Dr Daniel Kertesz, World Health Organisation (WHO) representative to Thailand, praised Thai authorities for their success in curbing smoking. This year, Thailand will organise |the World No Tobacco event under the “Cigarettes Burn Your Lungs” theme to highlight the damage |cigarettes cause to these crucial organs.

The event, set for Friday at Central Festival EastVille, will also include an award-presentation to individuals and organisations who have made outstanding contributions to the country’s tobacco control.

According to Piyasakol, smoking causes one death every four seconds on average at the global level.

“Legal proceedings have already begun and will continue,” Piyasakol said when asked about Foreign Minister Don Pramudwinai reportedly asking the PM to put the brakes on the lawsuit.

The government is suing Philip Morris for evading taxes worth Bt60 billion by allegedly declaring that a pack of cigarettes is sold for Bt7, when in reality a pack of cigarettes is sold for Bt145.

Dr Hatai Chitanondh, who chairs the Thailand Health Promotion Institute, said last week that the government has solid evidence against the tobacco firm. He also said that the government should not worry about the complaint Manila has filed with the World Trade Organisation (WTO) in relation to Thailand’s Customs and Fiscal Measures on cigarettes from the Philippines. Philip Morris has a large manufacturing plant in the Philippines.

“The dispute filed with the WTO will not result in a fine,” he said.

He was speaking in response to reports that Don had written a confidential letter to Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha raising concerns about the dispute at the WTO and asking the premier to suspend the lawsuit in the hope of settling the matter out of court.

Vasin Pipattanacha, an assistant director of the Tobacco Control Research Centre at Mahildol University’s Faculty of Medicine Ramathibodi Hospital, said Thailand was obliged to comply with the World Health Organisation on the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control.

“So, we can’t just focus on the WTO complaint,” he said.

The national park is located in Trang’s Koh Kradan.

The investigators, armed with a court search order, will inspect the plots closely and map them in line with related evidence that is available.

The plots in question, covering a total area of more than 100 rai (16 hectares), were distributed among the poor under a 1998 Cabinet resolution instructing concerned agencies including the DNP to allow land use rights to poor farmers having overlapping claims.

However, there was no hard evidence of some five plots being used before, so the department decided to revoke the land-use rights for them. It also found that the sixth plot, covering an area of around 10 rai, had changed hands and encroached upon by some resort buildings.

The remaining four plots, covering 50 rai, are part of a legal fight between the owner and the department, which has insisted that the owner have the Nor Sor 3 Kor land-title deeds.

The owner of the plots had filed charges against the department for causing a disturbance, but the court of first instance ruled in favour of the department.

The four plots now have some resort buildings, though they have not yet been opened.

The owner has been insisting on his right over the plots and vows to continue building.

The prize recognises those “who engage in creative dissent, exhibiting courage and creativity to challenge injustice and live in truth”, the international rights group noted.

The Thai musicians are among this year’s three laureates, which also include Ramy Essam, an Egyptian musician in exile, and Venezuelan political cartoonist Rayma Suprani.

The international civil rights group awarded its creativity award to the Thai artists whose music criticised Thailand’s junta and justice system.

RAD were threatened with legal action for their 2018 hit song “Prathet Ku Me” (“My Country’s Got …”).

Its video was downloaded more than 63 million times worldwide and made a great impression on Thailand’s social media users.

Two members of RAD – Liberate P and Jacoboi – are flying to Norway to attend the awards ceremony, which will be held at the Oslo Freedom Forum ,the same event that invited veteran Thai journalist Pravit Rojanaphruk to speak in 2015.

“Please keep supporting us,” the group posted on their Facebook page.

The anti-dictatorship rap song that riled the junta-led government also sparked intense debate and hinted at a mood change in both the political and arts spheres in Thailand in 2018.

The 10-member RAD used social media as an artistic weapon – the government tried to ban it, warning that its message and video footage replicating the 1976 massacre at Thammasat University violated the Computer Crime Act’s rules against spreading information inconsistent with the truth and also threatened national security.

The effort failed, however – RAD cheated the censors by using blockchain technology to prevent the government from deleting the video or barring access to it.

Indeed, the video has polarised society, generating extreme points of view among people from all walks of life, from scholars and politicians to teenagers and monks.

The impact of this phenomenon reflects the fact that many Thais feel under stress, wanting to call for democracy while living under a dictatorial government.

The goal is to boost rice-producing capacity and add value to Thai rice and penetrate new markets.

Agriculture and Cooperatives Minister Grisada Boonrach said his office had joined with the Deutsche Gesellschaft fur Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH, which is the German federal enterprise supporting sustainable development worldwide, to carry out the project, called Thai Rice NAMA (Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Actions).

The project received financial support worth 14.9 million euros (about Bt530 million) from the governments of Germany, the UK, Denmark as well as the European Union through the multi-donor Nationally NAMA facility project (2018-2023).

Under this project, some 100,000 local rice farming households covering 2.8 million rai of rice fields in six provinces of Chainat, Angthong, Pathum Thani, Sing Buri, Ayutthaya, and Suphan Buri would shift to a sustainable method of rice-growing. This is intended to increase their productivity while also cutting greenhouse gas emissions, which contribute to the rising global temperature, the minister said.

The project’s main objectives were; to create benefits to farmers in terms of the promotion of zero emission rice-growing and the promotion of Good Agricultural Practice (GAP) for rice; to develop and expand business that provide technology to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from rice-growing; and to motivate the rice-producing sector to apply the method that can cut greenhouse gas emissions, Grisada said.

Deputy Permanent Secretary for Agriculture and Cooperatives, Doojduan Sasanavin, said Thailand has pledged to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 20-25 per cent within the year 2030 in the Paris Agreement within the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.

This will be done by applying the King Rama IX’s ‘sufficiency economy’ principle, reduce the use of fossil fuels and applying alternative energy that is environmentally friendly instead.

The project – having a revolving fund and providing training to farmers – would have farmers shifting from their current method of rice growing to apply the low greenhouse gas-emitting way, use appropriate rice seed strain and related technologies (such as the land-levelling, the alternated wet and dry water management for rice fields, the fertiliser application based on soil testing and analysing, and the rice straw and stubble management to avoid applying a haze-creating method of burning).

The agricultural technology service providing companies also got special “green loans” from Bank for Agriculture and Agricultural Cooperatives, she said.

Doojduan said this project would benefits 454,200 rice farmers and agriculture technology service providers, while the 2.58 million rais of target rice field in the rainy season and off-season rice growing were expected to yield a total of 4 million tonnes per year.

Thailand Port Authority director Kamolsak Phromprayoon yesterday revealed that the overall damage from the burning of toxic chemical cargo onboard the South Korean ship, KMTC Hongkong, at the Laem Chabang Seaport would exceed Bt100 million.

He said the fire had caused wide disruption to the port’s shipment transport and traffic, and there was a fallout on other shipments due to the chemical spill besides the large-scale impact on the local people’s health.

“We still cannot put an exact figure on the extent of damage from the fire, as the damage is widespread,” Kamolsak said.

“So, we would like to invite all business owners and people affected by the fire and chemical leakage to report their damage to the Thailand Port Authority in order to let us calculate the exact amount of damage and allow us to claim compensation from the owners of these toxic chemical shipments.”

As the number of affected stakeholders, who were yet to register and report their damage to the authorities, was large he said Thailand Port Authority has decided to extend |the registration period for another day.

He said people who had yet to register their damage, could do so by showing up at the any of three reporting centres – Laem Chabang City Municipality, Ban Na Community, and Laem Chabang Police Station – until 4.30pm today.

Meanwhile, Thailand Port Authority has been urged to set up a special working group with relevant agencies to investigate the full extent of the impact from the chemical contamination on people’s health and the environment.

Penchom Saetang, director of Ecological Alert and Recovery – Thailand (Earth), insisted that the authorities should press for compensation from the owners of the shipment to remedy the damage to people’s health and the ecosystem.

Claim full compensation 

“There must be a full investigation into this incident in order to find the wrongdoers, calculate the total extent of environmental and health impacts from the incident and claim full compensation from the wrongdoers,” Penchom said.

She suggested that since such chemical leaks could have long-term environmental and health impacts on the affected people and ecosystems, the relevant agencies should set up a system to regularly check on the environment and people’s health after the incident.

“From the Pollution Control Department’s report, we notice that hazardous pollutants such as Volatile Organic Compounds, formaldehyde and chlorine gas have been released due to the burning of the chemicals and all of them can cause long-term health impacts such as cancer to those exposed to them,” she said.

“Therefore, it is very important for the authorities to keep a record of the long-term impacts to people and the environment, so that we can demand more compensation from the wrongdoers to cover future expenses to treat people’s sicknesses and clean up the leftover chemical contamination in the environment.”

Greenpeace country director for Thailand Tara Buakamsri suggested that Thai authorities should invite a third party to join the official investigation into the incident to publicly report on every aspect of this environmental disaster.

Tara added that all related agencies should step up their law-enforcement efficiency to ensure better prevention of the smuggling of toxic chemicals and other offences that could harm people’s health and environment from marine transportation in the future.

WHO member states have revised their classification of “Diseases and Related Health Problems” to include gaming addiction as a mental health disorder.

The change, which will come into effect on January 1, 2022, identifies gaming addiction as falling into the subcategory of disorders due to substance use or addictive behaviour, such as alcoholism, gambling addiction and drug abuse.

According to the WHO, gaming addiction is characterised by impaired control over gaming, increasing priority given to gaming over other activities to the extent that gaming takes precedence over other interests and daily activities, and continuation or escalation of gaming despite the occurrence of negative consequences.

However, not all excessive gaming behaviours are considered gaming addiction, as the world health agency explained that for gaming disorder to be diagnosed, the behaviour pattern must have lasted at least 12 months and significantly impaired the person’s life.

The Thai Tourist Police Bureau sent 40 officials to the luxury block ‘C Ekkamai’ three days after residents complained that the culprits were also not reporting the checking-in of foreigners, as required in law, and running a quasi-hotel operation.

There was even a “check-in” procedure, a faux-reception area set up to receive guests as well as a maid service provided for the ‘guests”.

Police say one person was charged with running a hotel without a licence, while five condo owners were charged with illegally offering their rooms for daily rental and not reporting foreigners staying in their property.

One person, a foreigner, was charged with not staying at their previously reported address.

The condo’s residents said they were furious that facilities they paid for were being used for outsiders, including tourists, to enjoy – the law limits rentals to monthly and longer terms.

The Tourist Police are now trying to track down the person who advertised the condos online.

Source: Thethaiger.com