More than 220,000 children in Kenya are using tobacco and related products everyday, a survey by the International Tobacco Control (ITC) says.

The survey also shows that at least 8,100 Kenyans die of tobacco-related diseases annually.

Those deaths make up 0.1 per cent of the global fatalities which currently stand at eight million people every year.

Basing its findings on a survey by the ITC, the report shows that 79 men and 37 women die in Kenya every week from tobacco related complications.

It also reveals that more than 2,737,000 Kenyan adults are lifetime tobacco users hooked to cigarettes on a daily basis.

Most abused drug 

The report whose findings were released virtually during the  World No Tobacco Day yesterday showed that tobacco is currently the second most abused drug in Kenya after alcohol.

Of the 2.7 million Kenyans hooked to cigarettes, the survey found that 391,000 are menthol cigarette smokers.

“This group lives with the thought that menthol cigarettes are less harmful to their health,” the report observes.

The ITC called on Kenyan authorities to introduce a ban on menthol cigarettes to help reduce tobacco consumption and initiation, particularly among the youth.

It is believed that if Kenya reinforces a ban on menthol cigarette smoking, the country would join more than 30 states and jurisdictions that have banned the cigarettes, including Canada, Senegal, Nigeria, Uganda, Ethiopia and countries under the European Union.

“Complacency in the face of the tobacco epidemic insulates the tobacco industry in Kenya and ensures that tobacco’s death toll will grow every year,” the report warns.

This year’s World No Tobacco Day theme was ‘Commit to Quit’.

The results indicate that 89 per cent of smokers and 75 per cent of smokeless users revealed that they regretted they started smoking cigarettes or using smokeless tobacco.

About 37 per cent of those who visited a doctor or health professional received advice to quit, the survey said.

“These findings point to the need to enhance access to cessation support through physicians or health professionals and affordable cessation services and treatments,” said Health Cabinet Secretary Mutahi Kagwe said in a statement delivered by the Director of Public Health, Dr Kepha Ombacho.

Kagwe noted that the ITC survey shows that tobacco products in Kenya, particularly smokeless and hand-rolled cigarettes, are inexpensive, and thus affordable and easily available.

Observed he: “The survey findings point to the need to strengthen enforcement on the ban on the sale of loose cigarettes as the majority of smokers, 82 per cent, last purchased loose single cigarettes rather than in a pack.”

The survey highlighted the threat from menthol cigarettes, which are particularly popular in Kenya.

One in five smokers in Kenya who have a regular brand of cigarettes smoked menthols, which is higher than in most high-income countries, according to the report.

The use of menthol in cigarettes reduces the harshness of tobacco smoke, which makes it easier for women, children and young adults to embrace smoking.

About 1,500 tobacco users and 600 non-tobacco users were involved in the study. It revealed that the introduction of pictorial warnings significantly increased the effectiveness of caution.

Project research 

The ITC Kenya Survey is a nationally representative probability sample of respondents aged 15 years or older, conducted through face-to-face household interviews using methods designed by the ITC project research team at the University of Waterloo in Canada.

Kagwe agreed with the findings, saying they show that the new cigarette pictorial health warnings have had substantial benefits.

“After their introduction, smokers were more likely to state that because of the warnings, they thought about the health risks of smoking – from 28 per cent to 43per cent – and that the warnings made them “a lot” more likely to quit – from 24 per cent to 38 per cent,” he said.

About 75 per cent of the smokers who saw the new pictorial health warnings agreed that they made smoking seem more dangerous.

Additionally, knowledge of many of the specific health effects caused by tobacco increased among all respondents between 2012 and 2018.

The ITC evidence suggests that increasing the size of the pictorial health warnings on cigarette packs and implementing pictorial health warnings on smokeless tobacco would further increase the impact of tobacco health warnings in Kenya.

Awareness of the tobacco picture warnings, according to the survey, increased from 64 per cent to 72 per cent of smokers; thinking about the health risks of smoking increased from 28 per cent to 43 per cent of smokers.

In addition to the menthol ban, the ITC called on the government to design and implement more public education campaigns to reduce misconceptions of the harms of tobacco products and decrease the social acceptability of tobacco use.

It also wants the government to increase access to cessation services to support tobacco users who want to quit, including increased training of physicians and health care providers.

Kenya actively participated in the negotiations of the World Health Organisation Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (WHO-FCTC) and in 2004.