Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2015, 12(8), 9683-9691; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph120809683
Perspectives on Tobacco Product Waste: A Survey of Framework Convention Alliance Members’ Knowledge, Attitudes, and Beliefs
1
Graduate School of Public Health, San Diego State University, San Diego, CA 92182, USA
2
University of Texas School of Public Health, San Antonio, TX 77030, USA
3
The Cigarette Butt Pollution Project, Washington, DC 20004, USA
4
Framework Convention Alliance, Washington, DC 20004, USA
5
Graduate School of Public Health, San Diego State University, San Diego, CA 92106, USA
†
These authors contributed equally to this work.
*
Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Academic Editor: Paul B. Tchounwou
Received: 18 June 2015 / Revised: 3 August 2015 / Accepted: 13 August 2015 / Published: 18 August 2015
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Tobacco Control 2015)
Abstract
Cigarette butts (tobacco product waste (TPW)) are the single most collected item in environmental trash cleanups worldwide. This brief descriptive study used an online survey tool (Survey Monkey) to assess knowledge, attitudes, and beliefs among individuals representing the Framework Convention Alliance (FCA) about this issue. The FCA has about 350 members, including mainly non-governmental tobacco control advocacy groups that support implementation of the World Health Organization’s (WHO) Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC). Although the response rate (28%) was low, respondents represented countries from all six WHO regions. The majority (62%) have heard the term TPW, and nearly all (99%) considered TPW as an environmental harm. Most (77%) indicated that the tobacco industry should be responsible for TPW mitigation, and 72% felt that smokers should also be held responsible. This baseline information may inform future international discussions by the FCTC Conference of the Parties (COP) regarding environmental policies that may be addressed within FCTC obligations. Additional research is planned regarding the entire lifecycle of tobacco’s impact on the environment. View Full-TextKeywords:
tobacco product waste; framework convention; cigarette butts
This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited (CC BY 4.0).
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MDPI and ACS Style
Javadian, S.; Stigler-Granados, P.; Curtis, C.; Thompson, F.; Huber, L.; Novotny, T.E. Perspectives on Tobacco Product Waste: A Survey of Framework Convention Alliance Members’ Knowledge, Attitudes, and Beliefs. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2015, 12, 9683-9691.
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