Jharkhand has witnessed a considerable decline of 11.2 per cent in tobacco consumption in five years as the nation wide survey on tobacco use released recently showed an encouraging result of several attempts being taken by the State Government and other stakeholders towards this direction. Showing a progressive trend, Jharkhand which was earlier placed in 8th position has now grabbed the 10th rank in improvement scale parameter.
The State-wise Global Adult Tobacco Survey (GATS-2) 2016-2017 report focusing on Jharkhand unveiled on Tuesday here in Ranchi by Minister, Department of Health and Family Welfare, Ramchandra Chandravanshi suggests, the tobacco consumption in State in 2009-10 was 50.1 per cent, which eventually came down in 2016-17 to 38.9 per cent.
Also, the State has witnessed a downfall in smokeless tobacco use as according to the GATS-2 survey report, in 2009-10, 47.9 per cent adults consumed smokeless tobacco while in 2016-17, the figure has declined to 35.4 per cent.
Chandravanshi on occasion said, “Controlling the consumption of tobacco and other such harmful products is the biggest challenge. Constant efforts are being made towards this direction. If all goes well, attempts will be made that a separate bill is brought in the State Assembly for completely banning the tobacco, cigarettes and other unsafe items from Jharkhand. The State health department has also engaged other departments in the plan for more encouraging results.”
However, the State Government needs to focus on curtailing smoking which is rampant in Jharkhand even at the public places. Despite several ‘No Smoking’ campaigns, Jharkhand this year has witnessed increase in smoking cases with 11.1 per cent cases. Earlier in 2009-10, merely, 9.6 per cent smoking cases were registered from Jharkhand.
To find out the use of tobacco and other such products in Jharkhand, a total of 944 males and 998 females were interviewed during the data collection from October to November 2016. The overall sample size across the country was 76,800 where more than men, females were interviewed on the habit of tobacco consumption. Under the categorizasion tobacco use by gender, GATS Jharkhand 2016-17 report, 59.7 percent males here consumes tobacco while 17.0 percent females use tobacco.
Similarly, in smokeless tobacco use category men are much ahead than women. 54.1 percent men consume smokeless tobacco while only 15.7 percent females were registered in this category . The trend of smoking is also high among men in comparison to the females here. Approximately, 20.3 percent men smoke, however, merely 1.6 percent females had admitted that they smoke.