Nudging smoking behaviour

Deadly habit: According to the Health Ministry, smoking kills about 20,000 Malaysians every year. — Filepic/The Star

COVID-19 has claimed close to 9,000 lives in Malaysia at time of writing. No doubt, this pandemic has crippled the national economy and disrupted the livelihoods of the rakyat. But there is another kind of peril that kills more people every year and is a destructive force against society.

According to the Health Ministry, smoking kills about 20,000 Malaysians every year. The Tobacco Atlas, an initiative of the American Cancer Society, thinks the number is higher. It says that more than 27,000 Malaysians die of tobacco-caused diseases every year.