Smoke Free Sweden: Health Experts Criticize Misinformation Epidemic Threatening Public Health in Central Asia

STOCKHOLM--(BUSINESS WIRE)--“RAMPANT and reckless” misinformation about alternative nicotine products being spread throughout Central Asia is endangering lives, say leading international public health experts.

Uzbekistan’s state media recently reported baseless claims that “vaping contains thousands of chemicals… and is more harmful than smoking”¹, following a ban on vaping products in neighboring Kazakhstan even after an independent expert report demonstrated that 165,000 lives could be saved² in the country.

That retrograde step, endangering the lives of Kazakhstan’s 3.2 million smokers, has been copied by Kyrgyzstan (1.5 million smokers) and is now being recklessly championed in Uzbekistan (more than 3 million smokers and 2 million naswar users).

According to tobacco harm reduction movement, Smoke Free Sweden, such claims will cost lives and flies in the face of recent publications in other countries, such as those by the UK’s National Health Service³, and leading anti-smoking NGO ASH UK⁴.

The claims are also at odds with the approach of Sweden, which has effectively beaten smoking by allowing smokers to switch to alternatives. Sweden’s official smoking rate is 5.6%, on the threshold of being declared officially ‘smoke free’.

Leader of Smoke Free Sweden movement and former adviser to three WHO Directors-General Dr Delon Human said:

“Anti-vaping, or anti-nicotine pouch fear mongering campaigns, are effectively pro-smoking campaigns⁵, and they are on the rise in Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and wider Central Asia, the resulting knee-jerk prohibitions undermine public health.

“Stifling regulation or worse, outright bans of less risky, non-combustible nicotine products are condemning millions of smokers to an unnecessary and avoidable premature death sentence due to continued smoking or consumption of harmful traditional naswar products

“Globally, these reduced-risk products are saving millions of lives by giving smokers an escape from deadly cigarettes. Countries such as Japan, New Zealand, Canada, and Sweden provide the proof which simply cannot be ignored.

“Attempts to bully the authorities of Uzbekistan and Central Asia into adopting deadly prohibitions must be rejected.”

Notes to editors

Smoke Free Sweden is led by Health Diplomats, a global network of public health experts committed to developing and delivering solutions to global health-related problems.

Sweden is about to become the first ‘smoke-free’ European country with a smoking rate of below 5 percent. This is a huge achievement and will be 16 years ahead of the 2040 EU target. Compared to the rest of Europe, Sweden has 44% fewer tobacco-related deaths, a cancer rate that is 41% lower, and 38% fewer deaths attributable to any cancer. This can be attributed to Sweden’s open attitude towards alternative products.

For more information on Sweden’s successful approach to becoming a smoke-free nation, please visit www.smokefreesweden.org.

¹ Xushboʻy dushmanning biz bilmagan jihatlari (youtube.com)

² d0e05b5eacc6a4f021b740d455a9ba49.pdf (thr.net)

³ Vaping myths and the facts - Better Health - NHS (www.nhs.uk)

⁴ ash.org.uk/uploads/Addressing-common-myths-about-vaping-ASH-brief.pdf?v=1691052025

⁵ Harnessing tobacco harm reduction - The Lancet