Hasan seeks medias role to prevent tobacco, e-cigarette addictions, Dr. Hasan Mahmud, the minister of information and broadcasting, urged the media today to help fight addiction to lead, tobacco, and electronic cigarettes. The minister made the call while engaging in discussion at an anti-tobacco meeting hosted by Unnayan Samannoy in the capital’s Biswa Sahitya Kendra auditorium, which was presided over by the organization’s chairman and former governor of the Bangladesh Bank, Dr. Atiur Rahman.
Hasan seeks medias role to prevent tobacco, e-cigarette addictions
Hasan said, in addition to cigarettes, it is now becoming a fashion for upper-middle-class and middle-class youths to go to lead bars in different cafes and smoke electronic-cigarettes. The youths are becoming highly addicted to those products, he added. The minister said the mass media could play a pivotal role in this regard. There are about 36 TV channels in the country and those can air reports regularly over the bad impacts of different tobacco products, said Hasan, also Awami League joint general secretary.
The minister also suggested that the private groups working on these issues send letters to the National Board of Revenue, the Health Ministry, and the Ministry of Law asking them to restrict tobacco product imports and marketing, particularly online sales. To safeguard the next generation and maintain national health, according to Atiur Rahman, tobacco regulation must be strengthened. Additionally, he continued, the media could be crucial in this regard.
While senior project coordinator Shahin Ul Alam delivered the welcome remarks, research director Abdullah Nodvi of the organization read out the keynote paper.