India and Tobacco products

• Smokeless tobacco products being marketed in India contain 3095 chemical components with serious implications for human health. About 28 of these components are proven carcinogens, areca nut the most commonly used of all.

• It comes in small pouches, is easy to slip into the pocket, is cheap — and is also a killer. Chewing tobacco, or gutkha, can cause oral cancer, and India has the largest recorded incidence of the disease.

• The Union Health Ministry today admitted the present pictorial warnings on tobacco products have not been effective as people did not understand their message of caution.

• Even as the government is delaying the notification of new pictorial warnings on tobacco products, a health ministry official Monday said they have received feedback that the present pictorial warnings are unclear to people.