Tobacco has been tagged as the biggest health threat to humankind and Bhutan does not seem to disagree. The south Asian country has previously enforced blanket bans on tobacco but it has not been the smoothest policy rollout.

World No Tobacco Day is marked every year on May 31. The day, as recognised by the World Health Organization, is used to raise awareness about the dangers of consuming tobacco.

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Bhutan banned any domestic production, sale and distribution of tobacco in 2004. The country also increased regulation on imported tobacco and increased the tax slab to 100%. People who were found using tobacco illegally were heavily fined.

Even though Bhutanese authorities attempted to curb the use of tobacco, it backfired. According to reports from MoneyControl citing surveys from 2006, the sale of tobacco in black markets had increased.

Illegal use of tobacco had now spread through minors too. More than 23% of Bhutanese children between the ages of 13-15 had used tobacco in the last month, according to the World Health Organization’s Global Youth Tobacco survey.

The strict anti-tobacco policies of Bhutan were short-lived. Jigme Thinley, who was the Prime Minister of Bhutan in 2011, said that the government would work to ease such restrictions.

In another survey conducted by the World Health Organization in 2013, the use of smokeless tobacco had more than doubled in a span of four years. The usage rate had gone up from 9.4% in 2009 to 21.6% in 2013, MoneyControl reported.

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The COVID-19 conundrum

In the early stages of COVID-19‘s spread, it was unclear what could make the health crisis worse. But smoking tobacco was widely assumed to be something that could make an infection worse as COVID was tagged as a respiratory illness.

Following the outbreak, the unregulated and illegal market of tobacco in Bhutan sprung back to life. The Bhutanese government responded by reducing restrictions. 

The ban on sale, distribution and import of tobacco products for commercial use was reversed by the government. The domestic ban, however, continued.