The University of Guyana yesterday teamed up with the Ministry of Health and declared the buildings on campus smoke free zones as World No Tobacco Day was observed.
On the tarmac at the Turkeyen Campus, feature speaker, Health Minister Leslie Ramsammy congratulated the university for being bold enough to join the fight and for picking World No Tobacco Day to do so.
“For the University of Guyana personnel here… you would be happy to know that Guyana is only the third country in all of the Americas to be a part of the smoke free sphere,” Ramsammy said.
This university is not merely a place of education but it is one of the drivers of this country, Ramsammy said. He added that despite many of the criticisms that the institution faced, yesterday’s bold action was testimony of UG’s commitment to contributing to the development of the country.
This comes seven years after Guyana signed on to the WHO’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) and Ramsammy says yesterday’s declaration demonstrated that the country is “serious and committed that tobacco will not affect our development as a country”.
Further Ramsammy stated that the declaration comes on a day when, “we join our sisters and brothers across the world to declare and to reaffirm our commitment to fight against tobacco anywhere in the world.”
World No Tobacco Day was observed under the theme ‘Gender and Tobacco with an emphasis on marketing to women’.
Ramsammy noted that tobacco accounts for 10% of deaths in the world and in Guyana 70% of deaths are caused by diabetes, hypertension, heart diseases and cancer all of which are impacted on by tobacco by either people smoking or second hand smoke.
“Tobacco is not a trivial killer. Tobacco is a major scourge and killer in the world. It is a killer that we freely pay to kill us,” Ramsammy added.
While imposing high taxes on tobacco is recommended, Ramsammy noted that at the end of the day it is people who make the decision. “We need to change our behaviour. It is time that Guyana turns its back on tobacco,” Ramsammy said.
The health minister called on all stakeholders to take the message of tobacco and its harms to homes as he envisions a day when “humanity will one day stand up united in banning tobacco”. He called on the gathering which included students from Apex Academy, Cummings Lodge Secondary, Cyril Potter College of Education and UG to pledge not to take up the habit of smoking, saying he never smoked a day in his life.
Meanwhile speaking on behalf of the students, Sherod Duncan, President of the UG Student Society said that he welcomed the initiative. He pledged that the students will do their part to keep the campus a smoke free zone.
The lecture rooms, dormitories, administration building, resource centres, library and cafeteria have been declared smoke free zones on the Turkeyen Campus. On June 4 the exercise will be taken to the Tain Campus.
Representative of the Pan American Health Organisation (PAHO), Rosalinda Hernandez in brief comments commended the Ministry of Health for its smoke free zones and commended the university for implementing it.
Hernandez said selecting the theme for this year’s World No Tobacco Day was not a coincidence since tobacco use among women in some countries is on the increase and urgent steps to curb this needed to be taken. The focus is on the harm of tobacco use while at the same time it seeks to make men who still remain the largest smokers in the world more aware of the effects of tobacco use.
The Ministry of Health works in collaboration with many partners including PAHO and has been building surveillance systems, coordinator of the Health Promotion Unit of the Ministry of Health Sabella Yussuf said.
Second hand smoke surveys among others and a programme to help addicts is currently being worked on but focus continues to be the promotion of 100% smoke free spaces.
