BACKGROUND: In 2020, the South African government banned the sale of all tobacco products for 20 weeks, as part of its COVID-19 response. Before the ban, illicit trade was a problem, comprising 35%-40% of the cigarette market. By 2022, illicit trade comprised almost 60% of the market. I investigate the mechanism through which the ban exacerbated illicit trade, particularly by smokers switching from legal brands before the ban, to illegal brands after.
METHODS: I collected panel data from people who smoke, including questions on cigarette brands purchased. The surveys were conducted during and three years after the ban. Both brands that were typically legal and those that were typically illegal before the ban, were available on the black market during the ban. I use probit regression analysis to test whether smokers switched to illegal brands in the long term, after mass exposure to these during the ban.
RESULTS: Smokers who, pre-ban, bought legal brands were 17 percentage points more likely to buy illegal brands three years later, if they had bought historically-illegal brands during the ban (compared to smokers who bought historically-legal brands during the ban). The mass exposure to illegal brands during the ban shifted many “legal” smokers into the illegal market, and many of these smokers stuck with illegal brands long after the ban. These smokers also significantly increased their smoking intensity after the ban (1.4 cigarettes more daily).
CONCLUSIONS: The sales ban entrenched illicit trade by exposing and desensitising legal-brand buying smokers to illegal brands. During the ban, many smokers of legal brands switched to historically-illegal brands out of necessity, and stuck with these brands in the long-term. Enforcement agencies were unable to stop black-market cigarette sales during the ban. When developing tobacco control policies, policymakers should consider enforcement capacity, to limit possible negative externalities, as was seen in South Africa.