PUT LIVES BEFORE TOBACCO REVENUE

Tobacco Free Association of Zambia wants President Hichilema to assent to the Tobacco Control Bill, warning that the country cannot continue losing lives to preventable tobacco-related diseases.

By Francis Maingaila ♥️

Lusaka, Zambia24 — November 12, 2026 — The Tobacco Free Association of Zambia says protecting people's lives should come before the revenue Government collects from the tobacco industry, as it pushes for stronger measures to prevent tobacco-related diseases, particularly lung cancer.

Association Executive Director Brenda Chitindi has appealed to President Hakainde Hichilema to urgently assent to the Tobacco Control Bill, which was overwhelmingly passed by Parliament before the August general elections.

Ms Chitindi said the legislation would strengthen tobacco control, discourage smoking and protect both smokers and non-smokers from the harmful effects of tobacco smoke.

She said the call was particularly important in November, which is observed globally as Lung Cancer Awareness Month, at a time when tobacco-related illnesses continue to threaten public health.

Ms Chitindi said smoking remained the leading risk factor for lung cancer, with research showing that approximately 85 per cent of lung cancer cases were associated with tobacco use.

She said the effects of smoking also extended to people who did not use tobacco but were regularly exposed to second-hand smoke, including children and other vulnerable members of society.

Ms Chitindi said tobacco smoke contained cancer-causing substances that damaged human DNA and increased the risk of developing lung cancer, with the danger growing the longer and more frequently a person smoked.

She said Zambia needed to take prevention seriously, especially as hospitals struggled to cope with the growing number of patients and the limited number of health workers available to provide care.

Ms Chitindi said while Government's plans to establish specialist hospitals for cancer and other complicated diseases were welcome, preventing people from developing these illnesses was equally important.

She said building more treatment facilities alone would not address the problem if the country failed to reduce the number of people exposed to tobacco and other preventable health risks.

Ms Chitindi said it was troubling that families continued to lose loved ones to diseases that could be prevented through effective public health policies, while hospitals faced increasing pressure to provide treatment.

She questioned the value of revenue collected from the tobacco industry when the country continued paying a heavy human cost through preventable illnesses and deaths.

Ms Chitindi said human life was more valuable than the financial benefits derived from tobacco, adding that Government had a responsibility to put the health and wellbeing of citizens first.

She said global estimates for 2020 showed that lung cancer accounted for approximately 1.8 million deaths, representing 18 per cent of all cancer-related deaths.

Ms Chitindi said Zambia was also affected by the growing cancer burden and needed comprehensive tobacco control measures to discourage consumption and protect people from exposure to harmful tobacco products.

She said civil society organisations and public health advocates had been pushing for comprehensive tobacco control legislation since 2010, making the Bill a long-standing public health concern.

Ms Chitindi urged President Hichilema to complete the legislative process by assenting to the Bill, saying Zambia needed to move beyond treating tobacco-related diseases and focus more on preventing them.

She said reducing tobacco consumption through legislation, public awareness and support for people seeking to quit smoking would help prevent lung cancer, protect future generations and ease pressure on hospitals.

Ms Chitindi said the observance of Lung Cancer Awareness Month should remind the country that many lives could be saved through prevention and decisive public health action.

She said protecting citizens from tobacco-related diseases was an investment in Zambia's future and that no amount of revenue should be allowed to outweigh the value of human life and good health.