Minister of Health, Kwaku Agyeman-Manu, has called for an increase in excise duties on three unhealthy consumables namely tobacco, alcohol and sugar-sweetened beverages.
The revision is expected to rake an additional GH¢3.5 billion which the Ministry urges to be channelled into the management of non-communicable diseases (NCDs) such as hypertension, stroke, diabetes and cancers, causing 17,000 deaths annually.
The Minister of Health made this known in Accra on Monday, July 10 at a meeting to disseminate a study by the World Health Organisation (WHO) on how such health taxes could improve health outcomes in managing NCDs.
The proposal put forth calls for the implementation of a specific excise tax that would raise the retail price of cigarettes by GHS6 and alcoholic beverages by 20%, as well as the introduction of a specific excise tax that would raise taxes on beverages with added sugar by 20%.
“The ad valorem tax should be maintained while introducing a uniform specific excise tax on tobacco products, introducing a specific excise tax on alcoholic beverages (based on ethanol content) and introducing a specific excise tax on sugar-sweetened beverages (based on sugar content),” Mr Agyeman-Manu suggested.
“It presents a good opportunity to expand fiscal space to support government priorities which include health-related interventions focusing on NCD prevention, early detection and treatment to mitigate a huge financial burden on individuals and the state in future,” he stated.
Mr Agyeman-Manu added that the increase in the taxes on these products may reduce their consumption, thereby averting some 34,600 deaths.
According to the Health Minister, the concept of health tax is a powerful tool for revenue generation which has been successfully implemented in many countries.
Mr Agyeman-Manu described the NCD burden as an alarming situation that requires the immediate provision of quality preventive, promotion, diagnostic, curative, rehabilitative and palliative care services for these diseases.
“The financing of NCDs, therefore, requires additional resources beyond the traditional annual government budget and this calls for exploring innovative financing to increase domestic resources,” he stressed.