• 9/18/2005
  • Australia
  • staff
  • World News Australia (www9.sbs.com.au)

Nearly all of Sydney’s south Asian grocery stores are selling deadly chewing tobacco, despite an Australia-wide ban on the substance.

A new study published in the Medical Journal of Australia has found 94 per cent of Indian, Sri Lankan, Pakistani, Bangladeshi and Fijian grocery shops sell products containing the tobacco. A plug of the product held in the mouth for 30 minutes delivers as much nicotine as up to four cigarettes and has been linked to oral cancer.

Researchers from the University of Sydney, who surveyed 53 Asian mixed businesses in suburbs with large south Asian populations, discovered 50 of the businesses sell the dangerous smokeless tobacco.

The study’s co-author, Professor Simon Chapman, says of those, 31 kept it under the counter, 14 on display behind the counter and five on shelves accessible by customers.

“I think the fact that they didn’t have the products on open display, but if you asked for it, it was pulled out from under the counter, suggests they’re aware they’re not supposed to be selling it.

“These products are very carcinogenic – rapid cancer can be caused in as little as seven years.

“Mouth and throat and tongue cancer are a very, very disfiguring and fatal form of cancer and totally preventable if people don’t use these sort of products.”

The manufacture and commercial supply of smokeless tobacco is banned in Australia but individuals can import up to 1.5 kilograms at a time of it for personal use.

The authors are urging the NSW Health Department to take swift action against shops which sell the chewing tobacco and for authorities in other states to investigate if it is being sold.