The recent poll, issued by British Medical Jobs, indicates that 85% of healthcare medical practitioners don’t believe that unbranded packaging on cigarettes will deter smokers, especially the teenagers the campaign is targeting. The government-planned initiative would put the UK as the leading country in Europe to take this approach.
For this poll British Medical Jobs asked “Will unbranded cigarette packaging deter smokers?”
Yes – 85%
No – 15%
The proposals, announced on 9th March - National No Smoking Day have yet to be confirmed. Under the new guidelines packets would lose their logos, graphics and brand colours, leaving only the health warnings as the most significant marking. The move would make England the first country in Europe to have plain packaging (Canada, Ireland, Iceland and Finland have introduced similar bans.). Ministers hope it would make cigarettes less alluring to the estimated 200,000 teenagers who take up smoking each year.
The poll created a lot of discussion on the forums it was sent to. One respondent strongly argued, “Let's see: put the fags in plain packets, and hide them under the counter in shops, so kids can't see them. I can just see your average teenager thinking ‘well, I fancied a smoke, but now it's all gone a bit clandestine, so I'd better not bother’, can't you?”
The general consensus of the polls was an overriding agreement that this legislation won’t achieve its original goal.
“It [unbranded packaging] is highly unlikely [to deter smokers], increasing the price continually hasn't had an effect, nor has a ban on advertising, nor has the slight change to packaging towards making it more dull,” said Oliver Moore, New Business Consultant, British Medical Jobs. “If the Government truly wanted to stop people smoking they would need to make it beyond reasonable cost for most people and lets not forgot the tobacco industry is a massive cash-cow for tax revenue for the government.”
The poll was run on British Medical Jobs’ Facebook and LinkedIn pages with a total of 156 responses from people working or having worked in the healthcare market.
For more information on BritishMedicalJobs.com please call 01395 22 44 86 or email info@britishmedicaljobs.com or follow them on Facebook, LinkedIn or Twitter @Job_Doctor.
