The health department will launch a week-long campaign against tobacco and related products across the State from January 10.
The campaign aims at twin goals — to rid educational institutions of tobacco and remove illegal advertisement boards promoting tobacco and related products.
Additional Director of Health Services (Public Health) A.S. Pradeep Kumar said schools across the district had been given guidelines to comply with. “If the schools follow the guidelines, they will be eligible to be declared as tobacco-free.”
“As part of the campaign, squads will be out to ensure that boards declaring the premises of educational institutions as no-tobacco zone are in place and shops within 100 yards of the institutions do not sell tobacco and related products,” said Mr. Kumar.
He said though educational institutions in Kottayam and Idukki districts were declared tobacco-free, it needed to be seen whether they continued to maintain that status.
Advertisement boards of the size 60cm X 45cm were legally permitted in the case of tobacco and allied products, he said. “They are not supposed to feature any brand name and should not be illuminated or decorated. This is being violated; huge advertisement boards of various tobacco brands are common. They will be removed during the campaign,” said Mr. Kumar.
Kerala Voluntary Health Services (KVHS) will be asked to conduct a survey after the campaign to ensure that advertisement boards pulled down during the campaign have not reappeared.
