By Albert Allotey
Accra, May 30, GNA – Ms Rhoda Mingle, the Communication Manager of the Vision for Accelerated Sustainable Development – Ghana (VAST-Ghana) has appealed to the government to provide a comprehensive regulatory framework to protect children from new tobacco and nicotine products.
She said: “Our responsibility is to prioritise evidence-based public health measures that truly protect communities, especially vulnerable populations, from tobacco-related harm.
“If we wait, we will lose another generation to nicotine addiction. But if we act now, if we invest in youth-focused awareness and hold the industry accountable, we can change the story.”
Ms Mingle made the appeal in a statement copied to the Ghana News Agency as part of the commemoration of the World No Tobacco Day tomorrow, May 31, 2025.
She stated: “I am not just making a policy recommendation, I am making a plea for our children, country, and future.”
She said the tobacco industry’s primary objective remained unchanged: profit maximization, not public health protection or genuine harm reduction, adding, “this fundamental truth must guide our policy decisions and regulatory approaches.”
The Manager said the World Health Organisation (WHO) Framework Convention on Tobacco Control outlined urgent steps to ban all forms of advertising, promotion, and sponsorship, particularly on digital platforms where youth are most exposed.
The rest are to strengthen enforcement to curb illicit sales and online distribution, safeguard policymaking from tobacco industry interference, constant public sensitization programmes in schools, markets, among others on the harmful effects of these products, and to collaborate across all stakeholder levels and institutions.
Ms Mingle said according to the most recent Global Youth Tobacco Survey conducted in Ghana in 2017, 4.9 per cent students use e-cigarettes while 6.5 per cent continued to smoke traditional tobacco products.
“This nationally representative school-based survey, jointly supported by the WHO) and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in collaboration with the Ghana Health Service, provides critical insights into youth tobacco use patterns in the country,” she stated.
She said these findings highlighted concerning trends in youth nicotine consumption, particularly the emerging popularity of electronic cigarettes while traditional smoking among adolescents remained a public health issue.
“Disturbingly, more girls than boys reported using e-cigarettes and that online marketing, flavoured options like strawberry ice or vanilla swirl, and peer normalization are fuelling experimentation.
“Meanwhile, public awareness of the health risks remains dangerously low, which the tobacco industry knows and is exploiting this gap,” she stated.
Ms Mingle noted that the growing experimentation with and use of e-cigarettes signal a shift in youth preferences and an expanding front in tobacco control challenges.
She pointed out that according to the U.S. CDC, e-cigarettes contain toxic substances such as acetaldehyde, formaldehyde, and acrolein, all linked to cancer, lung damage, and cardiovascular disease reinforcing.
She said the WHO has asserted that these products have not delivered a net public health benefit, but instead, threaten to renormalize smoking, and undo decades of progress.
The Manager said the lack of awareness about the risks associated with these new tobacco and nicotine products was one of the biggest tools the industry used to recruit lifelong customers.
“Many users, especially young people, don’t even know these devices contain highly addictive nicotine, nor do they realize the extent of harm associated with their use. It’s like a virus that keeps mutating to escape detection, while continuing to destroy from within,” she noted.
She said, “We need a comprehensive regulatory framework: one that bans advertising, restricts flavourings that attract children, and implements age-verification systems across all sales platforms, both physical and digital.”
“So, this World No Tobacco Day, I am not just making a policy recommendation, I am making a plea. For our children, country, and future,” Ms Mingle stated.
She emphasised that tobacco and nicotine addiction remain the leading preventable causes of death worldwide, killing over seven million people annually.
“But the new frontier is more deceptive, more technologically advanced, and more socially normalized. Let’s not be fooled by sleek branding and flavour names.
“Let’s see through the vapor and commit to action that safeguards public health, especially the health of the younger generation and vulnerable populations,” she advised.
GNA
Edited by Benjamin Mensah
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