Economics of tobacco control

Though the devastating health effects of tobacco use are well known, tobacco’s negative repercussions extend well beyond the obvious health outcomes. Tobacco consumption creates a significant economic burden on societies because of both the high costs of health care and the associated lost productivity. In addition, tobacco use contributes to health inequalities and exacerbates poverty within and between countries through the diversion of resources away from food and other essential needs as well as through foregone income. These and other adverse consequences of the tobacco epidemic disproportionately affect low- and middle-income countries, where more than 80% of the world’s smokers now live, including 127 million (or 11.4%), in the Region of the Americas.

Despite the clear path forward set forth by the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) and abundant evidence on the effectiveness of increasing taxes to reduce tobacco consumption, taxation remains the least widely implemented FCTC measure. The relative paucity of country- and region-specific evidence on the economic aspects of tobacco control limits the ability of health authorities to effectively advocate for comprehensive implementation of the FCTC. This thematic issue of the Pan American Journal of Public Health addresses this gap by presenting systematic regional evidence on the effectiveness of tobacco taxes that is consistent with global findings.

Curbing the tobacco epidemic in the Americas
[Contención de la epidemia de tabaquismo en las Américas]

Carissa F. Etienne
Editorial | PDF English | PDF español | Published November 2 |

The case of tobacco taxation: where we are and how to accelerate its use for public health [Impuestos al tabaco: dónde estamos y cómo impulsar su uso en la salud pública]

Rosa Carolina Sandoval, Itziar Belausteguigoitia, and Anselm Hennis
Editorial | PDF English | PDF español | Published November 2 |

Addressing the evidence gap to stimulate tobacco control in Latin America and the Caribbean [Abordaje de la brecha de evidencia para fomentar el control del tabaquismo en América Latina y el Caribe]

Natacha Lecours and Greg Hallen
Editorial | PDF English | PDF español | Published November 2 |

Carga de enfermedad atribuible al uso de tabaco en Argentina y potencial impacto del aumento de precio a través de impuestos [Burden of disease attributable to tobacco use in Argentina and potential impact of price increases through taxes]

Impacto económico del tabaquismo en los sistemas de salud de América Latina: un estudio en siete países y su extrapolación a nivel regional [Financial impact of smoking on health systems in Latin America: A study of seven countries and extrapolation to the regional level]

Andrés Pichon-Riviere, Ariel Bardach, Federico Augustovski, Andrea Alcaraz, Luz Myriam Reynales-Shigematsu, Márcia Teixeira Pinto, Marianela Castillo-Riquelme, Esperanza Peña Torres, Diana Isabel Osorio, Leandro Huayanay, César Loza Munarriz, Belén Sáenz de Miera-Juárez, Verónica Gallegos-Rivero, Catherine De La Puente, María del Pilar Navia-Bueno y Joaquín Caporale
Original Research | Abstract | PDF (español) | PDF (English) | Published November 2 |

Elasticidad precio de la demanda de cigarrillos y alcohol en Ecuador con datos de hogares [Price elasticity of demand for cigarettes and alcohol in Ecuador, based on household data]

Impuestos y demanda de cigarrillos en Colombia [Cigarette taxes and demand in Colombia]

La demanda de cigarrillos y el aumento de impuestos en El Salvador [Demand for cigarettes and tax increases in El Salvador]

Increasing excise taxes in the presence of an illegal cigarette market: the 2011 Brazil tobacco tax reform [El alza de los impuestos indirectos en presencia de un mercado negro de cigarrillos: la reforma brasileña de los impuestos sobre el tabaco del 2011]

Implications of raising cigarette excise taxes in Peru [Efectos de aumentar los impuestos indirectos sobre tabaco en el Perú]

Evaluación de la campaña antitabaco en Uruguay: balance de diez años y desafíos [Evaluation of Uruguay’s antismoking campaign: progress and challenges at ten years]

Niveles de ingreso y prevalencia de tabaquismo en América Latina: revisión sistemática y metaanálisis [Income and smoking prevalence in Latin America: a systematic review and meta-analysis]

El impacto de los precios e impuestos sobre el consumo de productos de tabaco en América Latina y el Caribe [The Impact of Prices and Taxes on the Use of Tobacco Products in Latin America and the Caribbean]

G. Emmanuel Guindon, Guillermo R. Paraje y Frank J. Chaloupka
Review | Abstract | PDF | Published November 2 |

Curbing the tobacco epidemic in the Americas [Contención de la epidemia de tabaquismo en las Américas]