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At stake is whether or not tobacco-producing Sadc countries should replace that money generating crop with an edible one in view of the universally known dangers posed by tobacco to human health.
The national economies of Zimbabwe, Malawi, Zambia and South Africa (although South Africa’s to a much less extent) depend on tobacco earnings. But tobacco is now globally known to be a major cause of cancer, especially lung cancer.
One of the dangerous substances found in tobacco is nicotine, colourless poisonous alkaloid whose name (nicotine) is derived from that of a 16th century French diplomat, J. Nicot, who introduced tobacco into France.
By an alkaloid is meant any nitrogenous organic compound of plant origin some of which are used as drugs. Quinine and morphine are well known examples of alkaloids.
The consumption of tobacco has been scientifically identified as one of the major causes of a variety of cancer, a disease that has become the second most common cause of death in the United States, the first being diseases of the heart.
Even then, heart ailments occur more among smokers, particularly of cigarettes, than among non-smokers.
The author of this opinion article does not have statistics informative about the causes of deaths in the respective Sadc states. It is a fact however, that a very large number of adults die of one or other of what are referred to by the medical fraternity as “chronic obstructive pulmonary disease” in the Sadc region.
These diseases generally referred to as COPD in short, attack about eight times more men than women. COPD include emphysema and chronic bronchitis. Higher incidence of these diseases is found among men most probably because more cigarette-smokers are found among men than among women.
A brief description of cancer will help us not only to understand but also to appreciate the importance of the present debate on whether or not to support the production and sale of tobacco.
Cancer is a kind of tumor or some abnormal enlargement of some part of the body. It is a mass of cells that have multiplied more than is natural or usual, and are not useful to the body. Medical people refer to such a tumor as neoplasm, a Greek word that means “new growth.” Such a new growth is out of control of the body’s normal checks and balances.
There are two types of such new growths: a benign one, which means that it is harmless and a malignant one, which means that it is dangerous to the body.
Malignant tumors tend to multiply and spread or migrate to other parts of the body, leaving the original neoplasm where it is, but sending colonies of cells elsewhere. Doctors call this process “metastasis.”
This process (metastasis) distinguishes malignant tumors from benign ones. A malignant tumor originating in the brain may metastasise to the lungs and/or some other parts of the body of the afflicted person. The results of such a disease are indescribably tragic. It is horrible to the extreme.
Now, let us answer the question commonly asked by many people: how does tobacco-smoking cause cancer?
Tobacco smoke damages the membranes of the mouth, pharynx, larynx, aesophagus, the lungs and even the lining of the bladder. It has been established through credible research that smoking particularly pipe-smoking, is an aggravating factor in cancer of the lips, that of the tongue, and the lining of the mouth.
Research has also established that various parts of the body that are subjected to continuous irritation are more susceptible than usual to cancerous change.
It is important to point out as well that it has also been established that consumers of alcoholic beverages have a higher cancer rate than non-drinkers. The rate is even higher among people who drink and smoke.
This fact notwithstanding, statistics show that cigarette smoking accounts for at least 90 percent of cases of lung cancer in the United States. The situation cannot be much different between the Zimbabwean and that in the US.
It is believed that the tar in cigarette smoke cancerously affects the lung tissues. Cigarette smoke irritates the bronchi and lung air sacs, rendering them susceptible to cancer and such other ailments as emphysema.
There is an argument about whether alcohol itself causes cancer or whether it is other additives that are responsible for cancer of the throat in non-smoking alcohol consumers. While that may still be debatable, we know that too much drinking of alcoholic beverages causes cirrhosis of the liver.
We also know that alcohol is a volatile, inflammable, colourless liquid which is the intoxicating element in beer, wine, brandy and other intoxicating drinks. We know too that its excessive consumption leads to the consumer’s eventual physical and mental dereliction.
Its resultant misery is all-embracing: economic, social, cultural (incestuous behaviour) and, in some cases even political.
That apart, a final look at tobacco, this time from an economic point of view. A State has four dimensions from which observers and analysts may look at it; the economic, the social, the cultural and the political.
The production and consumption of tobacco are aspects of Zimbabwe’s economic and social life.
Tobacco earns Zimbabwe colossal sums of money, contributing significantly to the country’s gross domestic product, so to reduce or stop its production would be to dent Zimbabwe’s national economy in the same way as it would that of Britain by stopping that nation’s whisky distilleries and breweries.
The best way to deal with this and similar problems is to devise effective ways to educate the nation concerned.
If the school syllabi were to have lessons on the dangers of tobacco smoking as well as those of consuming drugs, that nation could record a change in the number of cancer patients in a decade or two. The number of imbibers and gutter-snipes (izibhonda) roaming the streets and avenues of Zimbabwean towns could be drastically reduced.
As people appreciate what they learn through formal education, their quality of life improves. Formal educational institutions could be complemented by informal social centres such as hospitals and clinics as well as cultural places like churches as sources of such educating. Positive response could much more easily be got from the respective nations by educating the people about the dangers and risks to human life associated with the consumption of tobacco than by adopting and applying prohibition and/or quasi-prohibition measures against the producers.
Legal (political) steps should facilitate the imparting of knowledge about the adverse effects of the consumption rather than the enforcement of the termination or reduction of the production of tobacco. The former approach would send a negative message to investors; the latter would have a required health nation-building effect.
In addition to this education about the ill-effects of tobacco consumption, the law would require every political party to propagate similar information to all its publics. Taxation could also be used to reduce consumption. The medium to long term effects of such a social-legal anti-tobacco campaign would be a marked legal anti-tobacco campaign would be a marked reduction of the production as well as consumption of tobacco, occurring with the passage of time rather than suddenly.
In that way, tobacco growers and all those relevantly concerned would have relatively enough time to adjust while the State is realigning its economic focus for it to be better able to shoulder its social responsibilities.
* Saul Gwakuba Ndlovu is a retired Bulawayo-based journalist. He can be contacted on cell 0734328136 and through email [email protected]
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