@fita_sa run this up the chain:

1) data on tobacco and covid-19 is still emerging and the studies so far have very weak methodologY

2) data on smoking and TB is voluminous and is a notifiable condition. Why has the argument around "health" not been advanced for tuberculosis?

3) the data on obesity and covid-19 mortality is much stronger than smoking. Fast food and Coke is thus dangerous. Eating a 1/4 pounder meal everyday for a month will lead to significant health complications - see Super Size Me

4) Cowan's Iron Law of Prohibition (Google it)

5) when looking at harms of drugs, one also has to look at harms of policy in prohibiting drug use. 50 years into the War on Drugs and there is not a single example where a ban and criminal sanctions has led to a sustained reduction of -any- drug use, including tobacco

6) forcing people to withdraw involuntarily without providing any of the several EBTs is unethical and amounts to cruel and unusual punishment

7) NONE of the registered treatments for nicotine dependance are available at state facilities on state pharmaceutical formularies

8) the main reason for this is because they are expensive. Privately, these treatments cost between R700 to R1200 per month, for up to 6 months. How the average person in RSA is supposed to afford this, I really have no idea

9) the quit rate for people withdrawing involuntarily, or without support, is about 3% - meaning 97% of people will continue to smoke

11) cigarettes are now more expensive and in lower supply - the likelihood of sharing is INCREASED, not reduced. This is a very simple concept.

12) what OBJECTIVE, peer reviewed, empirical data is government using to accurately evaluate the effect of the smoking ban? Both on Covid-19 and also on prevalence of smoking? And importantly, how was this data collected?

13) based on Cele's figures, at R100/box, police have interrupted the supply chain of 24000 boxes. Or 24K smokers were unable to buy one packet (CI 12K - 100K boxes).

Put another way:
24 000 out of 11 000 000 smokers (0.2%) were stopped buying ONE box over TWO months. Slowclap.

14) what has been the cost ito of man hours and monies spent on enforcing, confiscating and prosecuting tobacco sellers and buyers?

Probably much more than R2.4million rand so its a pretty poor return on investment.

15) Which EXPERTS in the field of addiction have said smoking tobacco is not harmful? None that I'm aware of.

Which EXPERTS in the field of addiction have said banning tobacco is a reasonable, responsible, cost-effective, ethical approach to tobacco use? None that I'm aware of.

16) e-cigarettes are 95% less harmful than smoking tobacco, based on rigorous MCD analysis.

There is ZERO data on e-cigarette use and covid-19.

Why are they also included as if they are as harmful? It can't be based on evidence of harm because there isn't any.

17) An MCDA on harms of Drug Policy compared a) totally illegal b) totally legal c) decriminalized and d) regulated policies on a variety of drugs & metrics involving harm to self, others and society.

Least harmful: D
Most harmful: A

A ban benefits none except the black market.

I could go on for days. This is my area. NDZ and the NCC are lost in the DKE. Too many acronyms?

18) The NCC trumpets "evidence" as informing their decision of extending the ban indefinitely, but it's clear as day they've only considered evidence that justifies their position.

19) This is junk science of the worst kind, and a shameless attempt to cherry-pick studies that advance a murky agenda.

What actual systematic review was conducted by the NCC? Can we see it? What were their search strings used? What studies did they include, or exclude? Why?

20) NDZ reportedly attended the NCC meeting with academic papers under her arm.

Using someone else's abstract as a scientific justification for draconian, harmful laws is nothing more than an unsophisticated smokescreen intended to deceive.

A very dangerous precedent, indeed.

@threadreaderapp unroll