Health Impact Assessment Scoping: National Tobacco Strategy 2012-2018

This health impact assessment (HIA) scoping report evaluates Australia's National Tobacco Strategy 2012-2018, designed to reduce tobacco consumption and related harm. The report outlines the project's description, preliminary methods, and procedures for assessing the strategy's credibility. It identifies stakeholders, including government bodies, HIA practitioners, and the public, and proposes a decision-making framework that involves cross-checking policy strategies with public feedback and baseline data. Recommendations include stricter penalties for underage tobacco sales, increased vigilance in schools, enhanced media involvement in awareness campaigns, and higher tobacco taxes. The report also details evaluation, monitoring, and follow-up steps, including screening tools to assess the strategy's effectiveness in reducing tobacco consumption and exposure. Ultimately, the HIA aims to identify gaps in the strategy and suggest measures for improvement, emphasizing the need for targeted interventions among high school students and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander populations.

Running head: HIA SCOPING REPORT
HIA SCOPING REPORT
Name of the Student
Name of the university
Author’s note

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Introduction
The HIA project will provide a description of the proposed project. It will identify the
significant health impacts of the proposed project by comparing the existing situation with the
situation before the development is being carried out. It will also give an idea about the
stakeholders that will be involved in the process, the decision making planning along with
possible sets of recommendations. The report also provides the checklists used for the screening
followed by evaluation of the procedures.
Project Description
Tobacco consumption is the most leading cause of death and diseases in Australia, hence
reducing the consumption of tobacco and exposure to second hand smoke is a sole priority for
the government (Lecours et al. 2012). In account to this, the standing commitee of the Australian
government has proposed the National tobacco strategy 2012- 2018, to reduce any tobacco
related harm in the environment (Nationaldrugstrategy.gov.au, 2018). This project mainly
focuses on raising awareness among the people regarding the ill effects of tobacco consumption,
establishment of the measures or limiting the interactions with the tobacco industry and ensuring
the transparency of very interactions with the government, avoidance of any conflict of interests
among the government officials and the employees. This HIA project will assess the credibility
of the measures taken up in this strategy.
Preliminary plan for the methods and procedures
The plan for the scoping of an HIA can be stated as follows:

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 Determining the appropriate level of the HIA to be conducted.
 Establishing the HIA team
 Identifying the impacts of the activity and the health related outcomes.
 Creating an HIA work plan
 Screening
A justification for the level of HIA to be conducted
The different levels of the HIA that would be conducted are the Intermediate HIA that
will be able to review the evidences available regarding any other HIA related to this topic. It
will involve the involvement of the different stakeholders and the time frame would be about 3-6
months.
The scoping report will assess the strategies that have been taken up for reducing the
tobacco consumption. The scoping will confirm all the taken strategies, identify and confirm the
preferred activities and the alternative technologies. The HIA assessment will be able to identify
the key issues identified in the impact assessment phase. The HIA assessment will be able to
assess the whether the involvement of the mass media are actually being able to provide
messages to the youths vulnerable to smoking.
Stakeholders involved
The stakeholders would be the any proponent or competent authority, the HIA
administering body. The HIA administering body will be able to oversee and establish the
procedural requirement for the scoping. Other stakeholders involve the HIA practitioners and the
experts who may directly work for the agencies that are involved or as consultants. Other

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important stakeholders would be the public, who are affected by the proposal. By involving the
masses, scoping assists in building the confidence in the HIA process.
Preliminary plan for the decision making and recommendation
Decision making
 Crosschecking the policy strategies with the probable feed backs of the public and the
outcomes
 Tallying the outcomes with the baseline data
 Identifying the crucial portion of the policies that have actually not been addressed
but was mentioned officially
 To recommend the possible measures to fill up the gap left in the National tobacco
strategy.
Some of the important factors have to be considered while making the decision making
process. It is necessary to access the prevalence of the secondary school smokers with the
previous year’s data. Furthermore it is necessary to keep an overview of the smoking prevalence
in the states and the territories and the changes in the daily smoking status of the Australians.
Recommendations
According to the reports the Australian smoking rates had fallen to a considerable level both
in the aboriginal population of Australia and the non-indigenous population during the period
1995 to 2014-15 (Abs.gov.au, 2018). In spite of the National Tobacco strategy, the estimated
annual decrease has not significantly changed for the last few years. Furthermore the smoking
rates among the teenagers have also increased (Banks et al. 2015). In order to bring about a
considerable change in the smoking rates, emphasis should be put certain steps:-

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 Imposing strict penalties of purchasing or selling of the cigarettes below the age of 18.
 Strict vigilance on the college campuses and high school.
 More media involvement of media in creating the awareness among the public (Bero
2003).
 Ban on tobacco advertising (World Health Organization, 2013)
 High amount of tobacco taxes (Chaloupka et al. 2012)
 Creating more awareness campaigns regarding the ill effects of tobacco.
Preliminary plan for the evaluation, monitoring and follow up steps of the HIA-200
A scoping process that is custom tailored will include a profile of the community or the
environment that is likely to be affected. The following things have to be addressed:-
 The geographical area and the time frame
 The institutional framework or the policy under which the HIA will be conducted
 Allocation of the resources and the responsibilities.
 Existing sources of information, constraints on the methodology.
 Modification of the design and the selection of the alternatives.
Description of the screening tools used
Screening of HIA involved the following steps:-
 Forming a core planning team
 Identifying the organizational capacity and context
 Reviewing the health determinants and the health impacts.
The screening checklist may be used for assessing the HIA proposal.

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Health determinant Negative impacts Positive impacts Affected population
Individual health
behaviors
Community factors
Livelihood factors
The following questions can be evaluated after the screening has been completed:-
1. Has the National tobacco strategy been useful in reducing the public consumption of
the tobacco?
2. Could the strategy reduce the amount of exposure to the tobacco smoking?
3. Has the policy helped some of the smokers to quit?
4. Could the policy induce smoke place workplaces and other public places?
Conclusion
The National Tobacco strategy has been successful to some extent as the rates of tobacco
consumption have decreased over the years. Yet there are many gaps left to be filled. It is
necessary to decrease the prevalence of the smoking rates among the high school students and
the Torrent Strait Islanders. In order to adopt more stringent governmental laws against the
tobacco purchase and trade. The HIA assessment further helps to understand that there should be
more awareness campaign supported by the media to educate the vulnerable group about the ill
effects of Tobacco.

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References
Abs.gov.au. (2018). 4737.0 - Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples: Smoking Trends,
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Nationaldrugstrategy.gov.au. (2018). National Drug Strategy - National Tobacco Strategy 2012-
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http://www.nationaldrugstrategy.gov.au/internet/drugstrategy/publishing.nsf/Content/
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