Smoking, major cause of death in Morocco, health ministry
Morocco, Health, 2/26/2005

Smoking is a major cause of death in Morocco, with a high rate of tobacco-associated cardiovascular and respiratory diseases, said Noureddine Chaouki, head of the department of non-transmissible diseases at the health ministry.

Dr. Chaouki, who took part in the World Health Organization in the negotiations that led to the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control which will enter into force on February 27, told MAP 34% of Moroccan men and 1% of Moroccan women aged over 20 are smokers.

In Morocco, which signed the WHO convention but has not yet ratified it, tobacco consumption is a direct cause of serious diseases of the respiratory tract, particularly ear-nose-throat cancer, lungs cancer, cardiovascular diseases and others.

According to the WHO, tobacco consumption is currently the single leading preventable cause of death, which results in the premature death of nearly five million people a year. If current smoking patterns continue, the number of deaths will double to 10 million a year by 2020.

He also stressed the importance of the Convention as the first international public health treaty and announced that the health ministry will hold next March 17 an information and awareness-raising meeting on the treaty for several ministries to push forward for the convention ratification.

Morocco developed a tobacco control strategy, embodied in a law that was enforced in February 1998 and that bans smoking in public spaces as well as tobacco advertisement.

However, he went, Morocco needs to adopt implementation texts for the law and to ratify the WHO convention, in addition to taking more stringent measures to cut smoking habit such as the increase of tobacco taxes and cigarettes prices.

In 2004, 14.5 billion cigarettes were sold in Morocco.

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