Government must act now or miss chance to legislate on plain tobacco packs, say campaigners

More than 3000 health professionals and campaigners have sent an open letter to the prime minister and the health secretary calling on them to commit to introducing standardised packaging on tobacco products in the current parliament.1

The letter said that, since the government first announced in 2011 that it would consult on standardised packaging of cigarette packs, more than half a million children had taken up smoking. It described as “a complete red herring” the government’s move to use an administrative requirement in Europe—which will take until 2 …