In the 20th century, tobacco use killed an estimated 100 million people — more than both world wars combined. Most of those smokers had no idea what they were doing to themselves. Tobacco’s deadliness was exposed more than 50 years ago, and a war on smoking has been raging for decades in the wealthiest countries. The fight has begun to expand to low- and middle-income nations where 80 percent of smokers live. Smoking rates are declining in every part of the world, with the exception of Africa and the Middle East. Still, one in five adults smokes globally. Tobacco is thought to kill 6 million people a year and is projected to take 8 million lives annually by 2030 as the population expands. A study in the British Medical Journal called cigarettes “the deadliest artefact in the history of human civilisation.”
In July 2017, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration said it intended to cut the level of nicotine allowed in cigarettes to nonaddictive amounts. Such a radical step could encourage millions of American smokers to quit, and tobacco company shares plummeted after the announcement. Already, the companies have been losing legal challenges around the world to rules that require cigarettes to be sold in a brown wrapper largely covered by graphic health warnings. The so-called plain packaging requirements threaten the profits of cigarette makers by impairing their ability to earn a premium on upmarket brands. The U.K., Ireland, France, New Zealand and Norway have followed Australia’s lead in passing these laws. The high cost of defending strong tobacco-control regulations against legal challenges had long discouraged poorer nations from enacting them, according to public health groups. But there are signs the tide is turning. China, where 44 percent of all cigarettes are smoked, banned smoking in public places in 2015. Uruguay defeated a challenge to its cigarette regulations by Philip Morris International Inc. in 2016. And India hiked cigarette taxes in 2017. To preserve their revenues, tobacco companies have invested heavily in the development of “vaping” devices, such as e-cigarettes, which deliver a hit of stimulating nicotine without resorting to a stick of burning tobacco.
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