Armenia Proposes Tobacco Control Laws, Seeks to Ban Public Smoking

YEREVAN””Armenia’s Health Minister Levon Altunyan announced on Wednesday that the country’s leadership had instructed him to declare war on smoking in the country, reducing the number of smokers by 30 to 40 percent.

During a press conference, which coincided with World No Tobacco Day,  the Director of the National Healthcare Institute Alexander Bazarchyan said that a new program has been developed to fight tobacco and has been presented to the government. The new program seeks strict legislative changes, improvement of healthcare services, public information/advertisements, and international cooperation.

According to a 2015 report by the World Health Organization, the prevalence of tobacco use among adults amounted to 25.4 percent (males 50.9 percent and females 3.2 percent) in 2012. “In the absence of strict policies for tobacco control, this figure can be increased,”