During the first 8 months of 2020, the total tobacco levy collected by Singapore Customs amounted to S$858 million. This compares with S$776.7 million during the same period last year, an increase of S$81.3 million or 10.5% (under Revenue Statistics >> Tobacco – second item).

With tourism grinding to a halt, this spike could be due to an increase in local tobacco consumption.

Inferring from the tobacco levy revenue increase, this has resulted in non-smokers exposed to even higher amounts of toxic secondhand smoke when most people are working from home. 

The rise in complaints about secondhand smoke wafting into homes dovetails with this increase in tobacco levy revenue since the Covid-19 pandemic. 

That people smoke more under stress is a given. However, non-smokers should not suffer from this unhealthy coping behaviour through involuntary secondhand smoke exposure.

This is not “anti-smoker”, but “anti-smoking” in a way that causes harm and death to others. One person in Singapore dies daily from secondhand smoke.

We have only ONE life, and that precious life should not be snuffed out prematurely due to others’ deadly indulgence.