Consumer forced to take the initiative
Your columns increasingly report a series of very mixed messages in Hong Kong's faltering steps towards preventing illness and deaths from tobacco.
The news that the Legco health panel recognises the essential need for enforcement of smoke-free policies is reassuring and gives hope that we have at least one champion with the power to underwrite public health protection ('Tougher action sought to enforce smoking ban', June 2).
On the other hand, in response the government asserts that a chemical assault on staff and diners through blatant violation of the legislation will not be a 'priority' for police action.
The secretary for health suggests responsibility for action lies with the hapless consumer and in order to achieve our rights to breathe clean air we should enact an elaborate charade to simulate breathing difficulties ('Non-smokers 'should feign asthma' ', June 7). Leaving aside the fact that people with previously normal health are injured by tobacco smoke, perhaps the Health, Welfare and Food Bureau could now assist these theatrical displays by providing diners with a manual of diagnostic symptoms for the whole spectrum of health problems which are aggravated by tobacco smoke. Should catering workers also rehearse acute attacks of heart and lung disease resulting from breathing dense aerosols of tobacco smoke?
Finally, along with other colleagues in the health sector, I despair at the news that Hong Kong's promotion of its tourism assets is now in the hands of a transnational tobacco company veteran ('He sold cigarettes, now he's selling Hong Kong', June 2).
His skills were honed by selling a product which kills more than half its users, and his previous employer has for years worked to undermine public- health legislation on tobacco control in Hong Kong.