A study on the ‘Impact and effectiveness of ban on gutka’ in eight States, including Karnataka, has found that nearly 92 per cent of the respondents from Karnataka had quit consumption as “gutka was not available”.
The study, conducted by Johns Hopkins University in association with World Health Organization’s Country Office for India and the Centre for Communication and Change-India, was aimed at understanding the impact of State laws that ban the sale and distribution of gutka.
Of the 1,001 respondents from Karnataka, Assam, Bihar, Delhi, Gujarat, Odisha, Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra, 157 were from Karnataka (Bengaluru and Dakshina Kannada districts). Of the 458 tobacco product retailers interviewed and 453 retail outlets observed, 62 retailers and 60 outlets were from Karnataka.
The summary findings of the study were released by Health Minister U.T. Khader here on Wednesday.
The study found that interest in quitting was high among the respondents, with approximately half of them having attempted to quit in the last one year. In Karnataka, the ban on gutka was imposed with effect from May 31, 2013.
The study shows that gutka ban did impact the use as none of the respondents used pre-packaged gutka since the ban. A large percentage of dual users (64 per cent) — users who consumed gutka along with other tobacco product — reduced the use of smokeless tobacco products after the ban.
Ninety-eight per cent of the retailers interviewed agreed that the government should ban the manufacturing, sale and distribution of other forms of smokeless tobacco, which serves as an evidence for further policy interventions in the realm of tobacco control in the State, said Pradeep Krishnatray from Centre for Communication and Change-India.
