An analysis of purchase price of legal and illicit cigarettes in urban retail environments in 14 low‐ and middle‐income countries

BACKGROUND/AIMS: To estimate and compare price differences between legal and illicit cigarettes in 14 low- and middle-income countries (LMIC). DESIGN: A cross-sectional census of all packs available on the market was purchased. SETTING: Cigarette packs were purchased in formal retail settings in three major cities in each of 14 LMIC: Bangladesh, Brazil, China, Egypt, India, Indonesia, Mexico, Pakistan, the Philippines, Russia, Thailand, Turkey, Ukraine and Vietnam. PARTICIPANTS: A total of 3240 packs were purchased (range = 58 packs in Egypt to 505 in Russia). Packs were categorized as 'legal' or 'illicit' based on the presence of a health warning label from the country of purchase and existence of a tax stamp; 2468 legal and 772 illicit packs were in the…