Not too long ago, momentum has been rising across the human rights area understanding the acute hurt brought on by tobacco corporations. That is made in particular evident by an necessary win in a technical coverage paper – a win that’s straight associated to advocacy efforts from ASH and our companions within the tobacco management neighborhood.
Human rights rules are the muse of all our work, methods, and approaches at ASH.
The previous couple of years, ASH has coordinated a worldwide motion to mobilize tobacco management advocates to name on UN human rights treaty our bodies (that are legally binding) to assist speed up the tobacco management motion by together with the harms of the tobacco business of their technical papers on how governments can higher shield their residents’ human rights.
Smoking negatively impacts a number of human rights which can be legally protected in binding UN human rights treaties, equivalent to the correct to life, proper to well being, proper to training, youngsters’s rights, ladies’s rights, and plenty of others.
As a result of these human rights are protected by related treaties, ASH and our companions report the tobacco business’s human rights violations to respective UN treaty our bodies when the signatory nations are reporting again to the UN with their progress defending human rights.
At this time’s Win for Human Rights
For the primary time, the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination In opposition to Girls (CEDAW) — the UN human rights treaty physique that protects ladies’s rights — has formally acknowledged the specter of tobacco use amongst ladies and women in Luxembourg.
Of their concluding observations, the CEDAW famous with concern that tobacco use charges in Luxembourg exceed the European common — particularly amongst ladies and women (as a result of CEDAW is solely targeted on ladies and women).
CEDAW referred to as on the federal government of Luxembourg to implement a nationwide tobacco management plan with a gender lens. CEDAW’s “concluding observations” are a type of homework project on what the federal government can do to raised shield ladies’s rights of their nation. And as we all know in tobacco management, one of the best ways to guard all of our human rights is to eradicate the tobacco epidemic.
This concluding remark comes because of the report ASH, Fondation Most cancers, and Génération Sans Tabac Luxembourg submitted to the 90th CEDAW session in February 2025 and our coordinated advocacy in prior years.
How we bought to at the moment’s win
ASH has constantly submitted experiences to UN treaty our bodies, however in 2024, we amplified these efforts by submitting 4 experiences to 1 CEDAW session, the place solely 8 nations had been being reviewed. Motion on Smoking and Well being was joined by ASH Canada, the Coalition for Americas’ Well being (CLAS), and the World Middle for Good Governance in Tobacco Management (GGTC) in submitting experiences on how the tobacco epidemic harms ladies and women in Chile, Canada, Japan, and New Zealand.
We efficiently reported on the tobacco epidemic to CEDAW for half of the nations being reviewed at that October 2024 session. Our objective was to encourage them to incorporate strengthening tobacco insurance policies of their suggestions again to the nations on learn how to enhance ladies’s rights.
ASH additionally secured a casual non-public briefing with members of the CEDAW committee in June of 2024, and we introduced how tobacco harms human rights.
Trying Forward
CEDAW’s concluding observations on Luxembourg are illustrative of the momentum and progress that ASH is facilitating for the tobacco management neighborhood in human rights mechanisms.
By remaining energetic, current and engaged at CEDAW, we’re bringing new advocates into the struggle towards Massive Tobacco, so we are able to finish it sooner.
This victory is about justice, fairness, and holding the tobacco business accountable for the human rights violations they trigger by the manufacturing, manufacture and sale of a lethal product.
Thanks for standing with ASH. Your help fuels these wins—and the worldwide motion to finish the tobacco epidemic for good.
Amplify this Win on Social Media
Use #TobaccoViolation
Tag us on: Fb @ASHglobalAction, Instagram @ASHorg, LinkedIn Motion on Smoking and Well being, BlueSky @ashorg.bsky.social
Pattern Posts
1.) Breaking: #CEDAW referred to as on #Luxembourg to implement a nationwide tobacco management plan with a gender lens:
This modifications the worldwide dialog. We are able to maintain governments accountable for his or her weak tobacco management insurance policies by UN human rights treaty our bodies.
#TobaccoViolation @ashorg
2.) Advocacy Win: #CEDAW referred to as on #Luxembourg to implement a nationwide tobacco management plan with a gender lens:
We should proceed pushing for tobacco to be handled because the human rights situation it’s.
#TobaccoViolation @ashorg
