October 12th is No Tobacco Day in Armenia. The small, landlocked country in the South Caucasus is marking the day with the usual public awareness campaigns, but some health groups can’t see the forest for the trees.
Armenian No Tobacco Day
Panorama posted a recent article on Armenia's tobacco control challenges. Not to be confused with the BBC documentary series, Panorama.am is an Armenian online news outlet that covers local politics, society and international affairs.
Within the article, Panorama quotes the Heratsi Analytical Centre, a health-analysis centre at Yerevan State Medical University, that suggests the day should be a call to action for the country to tackle the health impact of smoking. However, in the same breath, they are also faithfully towing the World Health Organization (WHO) line, and fretting about the emergence of new nicotine products in the region, such as vapes and pouches.
While we are all well used to this kind of bizarre throat-clearing about lethal combustible cigarettes before the laser focus on lower-risk products, there is one shocking statistic that really highlights the absurdity of this confused focus. According to WHO data for 2024, Armenia has a 24.3% smoking rate among citizens who are 15 and over. However, smoking among men is 51.7%.
A smoking prevalence of 1 in 2 is startling. So too is the fact that these figures have not shifted since Armenia’s 2016 STEPS survey surveyed smoking among Armenian adults aged 18–69.
Armenia’s current tobacco-control framework
Now, you might think that having a sky-high smoking rate must mean that Armenia’s current tobacco control framework is very lax. You’d be wrong. Instead, having become a party to the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control on 27 February 2005, Armenia has implemented a raft of the standard regulations, including:
Smoking is banned indoors, at work, and at cafes, bars, and restaurants.
Tobacco retail displays are banned.
It is illegal to sell to under-18s.
Sales are prohibited in vending machines.
Despite implementing these recommendations, smoking prevalence has stagnated. Why?
Why is tobacco control not working in Armenia?
The WHO has sold various nation-states on the dream that regulatory toughness on cigarettes will magically turn into lower smoking prevalence. However, one of the many problems that the WHO overlooks is that citizens need to buy into the project.
A 2025 study suggests the regulations didn’t work because of weak enforcement, a well-established smoking culture, and low public support for these restrictions. What’s more, the country is big on hospitality, which means that households make exceptions for guests or permit smoking in particular rooms, such as kitchens or balconies.
We also can’t escape the fact that smoking is gendered in the country. Some additional 2024 research shows that establishing a smoke-free home often requires challenging older, male relatives on their well-grooved habits. In other words, there exists a hierarchical social pressure to tolerate smoking.
Missing a trick
When Armenia implemented a hospitality ban on smoking in terraces and other outdoor seating areas of restaurants, cafés and bars, they also prohibited e-cigarettes. This detail is a function of a 2020 law regulating cigarettes and “tobacco substitutes” together.
To me, this represents a huge missed opportunity. If Armenia were serious about reducing smoking, they should have left e-cigarettes out of the hospitality ban. Pavement cafés, courtyard seating and open-air terraces are a big part of social life, especially in Yerevan. Allowing people to vape would have made the transition away from smoking in these spaces far easier.
Some people need an alternative to quit cigarettes. Allowing people to still consume nicotine in a low-risk way could really start eating away at those excessively high prevalence figures.
The costs of inaction
Sweden and the UK are good examples of countries that didn’t get in the way of harm reduction products. In Sweden, pouches and snus have helped drive smoking below 4%, while in the UK, vapers outnumber smokers, and overall smoking has dropped to around 10%.
There is a pressing need for Armenia to do something to make a dent in the outrageously high and stubborn male smoking rate. It’s obvious that WHO-recommended policies are not working.
Instead of treating vapes and pouches as if they carry anywhere near the risk of cigarettes, they should embrace harm reduction.
While recent data is not available, a 2021 joint government–UN assessment estimated approximately 5,500 tobacco-related deaths and AMD 273.1 billion (approx. £569 million) in economic costs between health care and lost productivity each year. To put the fatalities in context, they accounted for nearly 20% of all deaths in Armenia at the time.
The government should do everything it can to help improve the health and productivity of its workforce. Armenia’s GDP is roughly half of neighbouring Turkey. Their mortality rates are much the same, but almost 4 years lower than the average in EU countries.
Vapes and pouches have disrupted smoking globally. The Armenian government should let them do the same in their region.
