Evaluation of Tobacco Control Measures in the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development Countries: A Comparative Study Using Data Envelopment Analysis

Background: this study aimed to measure the efficiency and productivity of tobacco controlpolicies across 16 selected organization for economic co-operation and development (oecd)countries from 2008 to 2014.study design: a panel-data study.methods: data envelopment analysis was used in this study. taxation on tobacco products andpictorial warning labels were chosen as the inputs. percentage of the population of daily smokersabove 15 years old and the number of cigarettes used per smoker per day were output variables.additionally, the malmquist total factor productivity (tfp) was used to analyze the panel data andmeasure productivity change and technical efficiency changes over time.results: the highest technical efficiency score (1.05) was attributed to norway, while the lowest(0.91) belonged to the uk. technological change with a total mean of 1.06 implied that thetechnology and creativity have increased, while countries have been able to promote their creativityover the studied period. norway with the tfp score of 1.15 was the most productive country, whilethe uk and turkey with tfp scores of 0.95 and 0.98, respectively, were the least productivecountries in terms of the implementation of the tobacco control policies.conclusions: most oecd countries have productively implemented tax and pictorial warningpolicies to reduce tobacco use. to achieve the optimum outcome of the tobacco control policiesand overcome the challenges of smoking use, countries need to tackle the difficult underlyingfactors, i.e. tobacco industry opposition and lobbyists, smuggling, and low socioeconomic status.