Graphic health warnings in cigarette packs will increase in size, declares the Australian government.

The federal government has issued new health warnings for tobacco products. These are meant to highten the impact of the proposed olive-brown background color of cigarette packs, said The Australian.

According to world-first plain packaging laws, the government aims to ban tobacco industry logos, enticing brand images, attractive colors and promotional text from packaging. Obviously, this is meant to lessen the interest of prospective buyers in tobacco products.

The legislation is scheduled to be presented to the Senate next week.

Bigger Graphic Warnings

The new warnings against smoking and the accompanying images will cover 75 percent of the front of the cigarette pack. Currently, the same content covers only 30 percent of the pack's front cover.

This will remove any "vestiges of glamour associated with tobacco," Health Minister Nicola Roxon remarked in thewest.com.au.

This move to renew and increase the size of graphic images on the packs was recommended in a review of warnings. It was found necessary to avoid decrease in impact due to familiarity.

The textual warning and undesirable graphic images will show the different diseases and health conditions that have been proven to be caused or worsened by smoking. These diseases include lung cancer, bladder cancer, mouth cancer, peripheral vascular disease and emphysema.

"The new graphic health warnings are a striking and confronting reminder of the death and disease that tobacco brings and are a proven, effective way of helping people to kick this deadly habit," Ms Roxon told a press conference in Canberra.

"Plain packaging and graphic health warnings mean that the glamour has gone."

Tobacco Industry Body to Challenge New Laws

In response to the new laws against the promotion of tobacco products, the British American Tobacco Australia said this week to a Senate inquiry that "Labor's plain packaging legislation is badly drafted and unfair."

BATA declares that it will challenge the laws once these are passed in court, arguing that the laws will remove "most valuable use of trademarks" without compensation.

Effective Images and Warnings

A study published in BMC Public Health, with the title "Smokers' Recall of Australian Graphic Cigarette Packet Warnings and Awareness of Associated Health Effects, 2005-2008," was conducted to determine the impact of images of tobacco - related pathology on South Australian smokers' beliefs about diseases related to smoking. It also investigated whether warnings with visceral images had greater impact on smokers' beliefs than other kinds of images.

Results revealed that unprompted recall of new graphic warnings was high in the months following the release of the warnings. It also demonstrated that smokers had increased awareness of smoking-related diseases that were displayed in the warnings. Lastly, warnings that relayed new information or had more emotive visceral images had greater impact on smokers' beliefs.

Movers of the new laws on graphic warnings on cigarette packaging are making use of studies such as these to produce the intended impact on smokers and warn people of the effects of tobacco consumption.