New Zealand is set to introduce plain packaging on Tobacco Products. The list of countries joining to take up the measures is growing despite the threat of legal action from the industry. This move is coinciding with ‘World No Tobacco Day’, which means cigarettes must be sold in boxes plastered with health warnings and gruesome pictures of smoking-related diseases.

Associate Health Minister Sam Lotu-Iiga said, “Twelve New Zealanders die prematurely every day from smoking-related illnesses each of these deaths is preventable.” In 2013, New Zealand first proposed the plain packaging saying it would “remove the last remaining vestige of glamour from these deadly products”.

But it was put on hold pending the outcome of tobacco giant Philip Morris’ legal action against the Australian government, which developed the introduction of plain packets in 2012. The lawsuit failed last December and since then a number of countries have passed legislation on the issue.

According to data from the Canadian Cancer Council, countries like Canada, Singapore, Belgium and South Africa have announced plans to follow the suit. Thus, the World Health Organisation (WHO) has made “Get Ready For Plain Packaging” the slogan of this year’s World No Tobacco Day.

New Zealand Prime Minister John Key stated the fact that many countries were adopting the packing had strengthened his government to ignore the threat of legal action from Big Tobacco. “They may well take a case against the government, but the advice we have been getting over time now has been that the risks of them being successful is reducing,” he told.

A study commissioned by the Australian government found tobacco use dropped 14.4% in the two years after Canberra’s world-first ban was introduced.