Plain packaging on way for New Zealand tobacco products

A law to take the gloss off smoking and introduce standardized plain packages for tobacco products was passed overwhelmingly by the New Zealand Parliament Thursday.

The Smoke-free Environments (Tobacco Standardised Packaging) Amendment Bill passed its final reading with a vote of 108 in favor to 13 against.

"Around 13 people die prematurely every day from smoking related illnesses. That is nearly 5,000 people each year. We want smokers to quit and we want to stop other people from ever starting," Associate Health Minister Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga said in a statement.

"Standardized packaging will make a measureable difference to smoking rates in New Zealand, just as it has done in Australia. It will make a difference to families and communities who see every day the harm smoking causes," he said.

"The bland packs will maximise the impact of health warnings and cut out any false impression that smoking is cool or glamorous."

The passing of this legislation sent a clear message that the government was serious about ending the unnecessary deaths from tobacco use.

Under standardized packaging, all cigarettes and other tobacco products will be in brown-green colored packaging, with enlarged health warnings and tobacco company marketing imagery removed.

Regulations, which are needed for the law to come in to force, are currently under development.

Australia's plain packaging regime has been in place since December 2012 and tobacco sales have reportedly fallen by 14.4 percent since it was established.

Tobacco companies criticized the proposals and disputed evidence they would cut smoking rates, but health groups and anti-smoking campaigners have welcomed them.

The New Zealand government is also progressively ramping up tobacco taxes, which will raise the price of a packet of cigarettes by 50 percent over the next four years, as part of its campaign to make New Zealand smoke-free by 2025. Endit