NATIONAL, 10 SEPTEMBER, 2023 (PNT): A total of INR 55,449 crore in foreign funding has been received by Indian NGOs in the past three years. While many NGO are important to support the government’s efforts towards public good, tt is not a hidden fact that many work with a larger political agenda.
For instance, former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg has been running multi-million-dollar campaigns to try to shape the lives of ordinary consumers. His efforts have quickly scaled to the level of the World Health Organization, including funding US anti-tobacco groups in the millions to even go so far to completely outlaw nicotine alternatives in developing countries across Latin America, Asia, and more.
While nations on these continents typically have larger smoking populations than in the US and Europe, they have thus far been deprived of the life-saving nicotine alternatives that would serve as a less harmful switch away from traditional smoking.
In February of this year, Bloomberg’s commitment to severely restrict harm reduction increased significantly to nearly $420 million. Over $280 million of that money will focus on developing countries, offering grants to political groups, health agencies, and politicians to implement a zero-tolerance nicotine agenda.
Bloomberg’s approach is not in denial of the real scientific evidence on tobacco harm reduction. Rather than endorse the market-derived alternatives that have been successful in getting adult smokers to quit. they have created a false equivalence between the safer alternatives and a cigarette.
That not only harms public health but continues to fester a narrative of misinformation that has captured many public health researchers and government agencies. We know this all too well from our cross-national survey of health practitioners in Europe, in which many doctors were simply unaware of the growing category of less harmful nicotine alternatives.
This content is published by Gurmeet Singh Dhalwan, Adbhhut Media
Comments
Post a Comment