Tobacco.org

Bid to filter out the glamour from cigs 

PARENTS in South Tyneside are being urged to help protect children from starting to smoke by backing a new campaign calling for plain tobacco packaging.

The Plain Packs Protect campaign is being launched by health campaigners Fresh, aimed at banning the kind of glitzy packaging which can attract youngsters.

Kids as young as nine in the region have been reported as starting smoking, and colourfully eye-catching and increasingly innovative packs of cigarettes can act as ‘silent salesmen’.

The campaign comes after the Gazette revealed last week that the overall cost of smoking-related hospital admissions in the borough has risen to £3.9m annually.

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MP warns about dangers of illegal tobacco 

SMOKERS need a ‘wake-up call’ on the increased health risks caused by illegal tobacco, said Hastings MP Amber Rudd.

She said that people buying under-the-counter cigarettes for a few pounds might not be so inclined to do so if they knew more about the level of harmful chemicals that these cheap packets contained.

Ms Rudd added: “I think they think what they are doing is buying the same cigarettes that they would get in Spain, or Belgium.

“What people need is a wake-up call, as smokers deserve to get the least damaging cigarettes.”

Following a BBC investigation in October last year into the illegal tobacco trade in Hastings and St Leonards, some of the counterfeit cigarettes were sent for testing, with one brand found to contain eight times as much lead as legal cigarettes.

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Cigarette packaging campaign  

ANTI-smoking campaigners are urging parents to back a new campaign calling for plain tobacco packaging.

The Plain Packs Protect campaign is being launched today in the North-East by health campaigners FRESH, aimed at reducing thousands of North-East child smokers who are attracted to glitzy brands.

The average age most smokers in the North-East start smoking is just 15, but some start at just nine years old.

FRESH believes eye-catching and increasingly innovative packs of cigarettes can act as ‘silent salesmen’.

Plain Packs Protect is supported by FRESH, Action for Smoking and Health (ASH), Cancer Research UK and the British Heart Foundation.

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Huge cigarette haul by masked burglars in armed raids at Northampton stores  

A GANG of masked burglars, armed with sledgehammers, stole "thousands of pounds" of cigarettes after smashing their way into two convenience stores in Northampton.

Detectives believe the raids, which targeted shops on opposite sides of Northampton within an hour of each other, were carried out by the same gang.

The first smash and grab happened at around 11.05pm on Monday, at the One Stop Shop, in Kent Road, Duston, when three men smashed a glass front door, broke the shutters and then looted the shop of cigarettes. The second, identical raid took place at around 11.55pm at the Co-op, in Wootton Hope Drive, Wootton Fields.

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No smoking in public advises Royal Jubilee midwife 

A senior midwife has advised staff at Belfast's Royal-Jubilee Maternity Hospital that if they intend to smoke, they should not do so in public.

In an email leaked to the BBC, staff were told that a member of the public had lodged a complaint.

It was over the sight of a member of hospital staff in theatre scrubs and hat smoking outside the maternity hospital.

The complaint was made at the height of the pseudomonas health care crisis.

The woman who complained said she had seen a member of staff smoking outside the maternity department.

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No doubts – dropping a match or a fag end could cost you £50  

DROPPING a cigarette end, match or wrapper could be seriously bad ... for your wallet in Kirkintilloch and Bishopbriggs.

Fed-up council chiefs have declared war on anti-social smokers who are littering pavements and roads throughout East Dunbartonshire.

A zero-tolerance campaign, ‘No Butts About It’, kicks off next month – preceded by a two-week awareness campaign.

You could even be hit with a £50 fine for dropping a cigarette wrapper or match.

Councillor John Dempsey insists: “Smokers need to take responsibility and consider other members of their community, as well as their local environment.

“If a smoker is unable to dispose of their cigarette litter in the ashtray bins provided, they must take their litter home and dispose of it in the appropriate manner.”

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Male smokers lose brain function faster as they age 

Men who smoke suffer a more rapid decline in brain function as they age than their non-smoking counterparts, with their cognitive decline as rapid as someone 10 years older but who shuns tobacco, scientists said on Monday.

In a large, long-term study, British researchers found that while there seems to be no link between cognitive decline and smoking in women, in men, the habit is linked to swifter decline, with early dementia-like cognitive difficulties showing up as early as the age of 45.

The research adds to an already large body of evidence about the long-term dangers of smoking -- a habit the World Health Organisation refers to as "one of the biggest public health threats the world has ever faced".

Smoking causes lung cancer, which is often fatal, and other chronic respiratory diseases. It is also a major risk factor for cardiovascular diseases, the world's number one killers.

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RUDD: House to Home with Amber Rudd MP: Risks of fake cigarettes  

Unfortunately the buyers and the vendors, are doing more than cheating the Government and fellow tax payers of the legitimate duty on the tobacco, which is bad enough.

They are also endangering the health of the consumers more than they can imagine.

The smuggled cigarettes are often not just duty free from across the Channel. They are ‘fake’ cigarettes.

However damaging regular cigarettes are, we do at least know the health risks.

But these unregulated fake fags, are loaded with lead and other nasty bits of poison.

Recently, a test of one packet of smuggled cigarettes revealed that they had eight times as much lead in them as normal ones. . . .

I urge smokers to check what they are smoking. Don’t touch the cheap smuggled brand.

They could be a lot more dangerous than you think.

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Smoking May Be Especially Tough on Men's Brains 

Smoking appears to speed declines in memory, thinking, learning and processing information in men, but not in women, new research suggests.

One expert said the findings are just one more reason to quit the habit.

"This study underscores that smoking is bad for your brain, and that mid-life smoking is a modifiable risk factor with an effect size roughly equivalent to 10 years of aging on the rate of [mental] decline," said Dr. Marc Gordon, chief of neurology at Zucker Hillside Hospital in Glen Oaks, N.Y. He was not involved with the research.

The new study was led by Severine Sabia of University College London. She and her colleagues analyzed data collected from nearly 5,100 men and more than 2,100 women who had three assessments of mental functions such as memory, learning and thought-processing over 10 years and six assessments of smoking status over 25 years. The participants were an average of 56 years old at the time of their first assessment.

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Counterfeit cigarette seller sentenced  

A man who sold counterfeit cigarettes and tobacco has been given a suspended prison sentence by Liverpool magistrates.

Francis Carl Graham, aged 42, of Ivy Avenue, Garston, was sentenced to 12 weeks imprisonment suspended for 12 months and ordered to pay £300 costs.

He was ordered to stay away from indoor and outdoor markets in Liverpool after the court heard that he had had been selling the illegal goods near to Great Homer Street Market

Sentence on a second defendant Brian Millea, aged 50, of Winfield Green, Garston, was deferred owing to his ill-health.

Both men pleaded to 18 offences under the Consumer Protection Act offences relating to the lack of health warnings and the Trade Marks Act Offences for the sale of counterfeit Lambert ansd Butler, Regal Kingsize and Superkings cigarettes and counterfeit Golden Virginia hand rolling tobacco when they first appeared in court in January.

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13 rescued from Plumstead blaze “caused by cigarette”  

Thirteen people, including six children, had to be rescued from their flats after a cigarette caused the ground floor to go up in flames.

Residents were trapped by the smoke after a fire broke out in a ground floor flat last night (5) at 11.34pm in Barnfield Gardens, Plumstead.. . .

Watch Manager from Woolwich fire station Justin Hudson, who was at the scene said: “We believe the fire was caused by a cigarette. This fire shows just how dangerous cigarettes can be so if you do smoke, please make sure your cigarette is completely out once you’ve finished with it. Hundreds of fires are caused by cigarettes each year in London and many of them could be easily avoided if smokers took better care.

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What’s okay to advertise on TV? 

Cigarettes, gambling, payday loans, abortion providers, prescription drugs and debt finance solutions should not be allowed to be advertised on television, say the majority of British adults, but other potentially controversial subjects, such as alcoholic drinks, political parties, fast food and laser surgery providers should be allowed to advertise in this way, our poll on the issue has found.

* 79% say that cigarettes shouldn't be allowed to be advertised on television

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Study: Smoking May Lead to Faster Cognitive Decline in Men 

the latest study shows that smoking is associated with cognitive decline as early as age 45, and that male smokers may be more vulnerable to these mental effects than women.

For the study published in the journal Archives of General Psychiatry, researchers led by Severine Sabia, a research associate in the department of epidemiology and public health at University College London, gave cognitive tests to 7,236 middle aged men and women three times between 1997-99 and 2007-09, when they were 44-69 years old, 50-74 years old and 55-80 years old.

The researchers also collected the participants’ 20-year smoking history through regular self-reported questionnaires.

And when they compared the cognitive scores to smoking status, they found that men who smoked showed faster decline than nonsmoking men over 10 years.The size of the effect associated with smoking was similar to that of 10 years of aging. Even after Sabia and her colleagues adjusted for the effects of heart disease, stroke and lung function on mental abilities, the effect of smoking remained strong. The more men smoked, the greater their decline. What’s more, the study showed for the first time that the smoking-related cognitive declines may begin as early as age 45.

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Impact of Smoking on Cognitive Decline in Early Old Age: The Whitehall II Cohort Study 

Conclusions

Compared with never smokers, middle-aged male smokers experienced faster cognitive decline in global cognition and executive function. In ex-smokers with at least a 10-year cessation, there were no adverse effects on cognitive decline.

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Smoking linked to faster cognitive decline in men  

Middle-aged men who smoke suffered more rapid cognitive decline than peers who have never smoked or who have been ex-smokers for at least 10 years, researchers reported Monday in the Archives of General Psychiatry.

Smoking is known to be a risk factor for dementia in the aged, but the extent to which it is a risk factor for cognitive problems earlier in life is less-well understood, wrote the team.

Led by Severine Sabia of University College London's Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, the researchers looked at data collected from 5,099 men and 2,137 women. The subjects were employees of the British Civil Service who had participated in the Whitehall II study, which launched in 1985 and which conducted its ninth phase from 2007 to 2009.

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