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Along with imposing higher taxes, banning smoking in public places, and antismoking education, prosecuting teens who use tobacco in public is a very effective technique for reducing smoking by children, says a new scientific study and Action on Smoking and Health (ASH).
The new study comes just in time because the decline in smoking by kids seems to be stalled, says public interest law professor John Banzhaf, Executive Director of ASH, who suggests that youth possession, use, and purchase (PUP) laws which currently exist in 45 states -- but are rarely enforced -- should be dusted off and more actively used as an additional technique to help prevent an entirely new generation from becoming addicted to nicotine.
Contrary to some alarmists, teens are not thrown in jail for smoking.
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On the first anniversary of England's smokefree law, public support for smokefree environments is still rising [1] and surveys show that most people are in favour of even stronger measures to reduce smoking and to protect children from secondhand smoke [2]. The law has also resulted in a fall in sales of cigarettes [3] and more people than ever are giving up smoking. [4]
Last week, the Office for National Statistics revealed that eighty per cent of Britons agreed with the ban on smoking in public places, with 61% strongly in favour, while a YouGov poll commissioned by ASH found similar levels of support with 63% strongly supporting the measure.
The number of heart attacks has fallen dramatically since the ban on smoking in public places was introduced last year, latest figures reveal.
More than half of of hospital trusts in England are treating fewer heart attacks since the ban came on July 1 last year.
Nearly six in ten NHS trusts are reporting a fall in the number of heart attack patients being admitted to emergency wards.
There were 1,384 fewer heart attacks across the county in the nine months after the legislation was introduced compared with the same period a year earlier. That translates to a three per cent fall across the country since the ban. . . .
Some hospitals have seen the number of cases fall by 41 per cent since July 2007.
The figures, obtained under the Freedom of Information Act, are the first available proof that the smoking ban has had a significant impact on health across England. . . .
Experts believe the ban has triggered a drop in heart attacks due to both the number of people quitting and the reduction in passive smoking as fewer people are exposed to airborne toxins.
New federal guidelines issued Wednesday for doctors treating smokers could trigger a wave of wrongful death medical malpractice legal actions, suggests Action on Smoking and Health (ASH), which serves as the legal action arm of the antismoking community.
Indeed, says ASH, there are over 40,000 potential plaintiffs yearly.
The guidelines require physicians not only to thoroughly warn smoking patients about the dangers of smoking, but also mandate that the clinicians provide one of more of the treatments which have been proven effective in helping people quit.
Yet most physicians reportedly fail to do this, and as a direct result a major study shows, more than 40,000 smokers die needlessly. ASH notes that hundreds of thousands more become disabled annually, and could also bring malpractice actions. . . .
when the majority of U.S. physicians ignore a very clear federal guideline regarding situations which occur every day (i.e., patient visits by smokers), the doctors' failures are deliberate, as well as often fatal.
Contract manufacturing helped boost cigarette maker British America Tobacco Kenya profits, but concerns remain over the company's ability to maintain the growth trend after June when the Tobacco Control Act comes becomes operational.
Shareholders expressed fears of business failure because of the increasing anti-smoking lobbying and the possibilities of legal suits from affected smokers.
During the company's Annual General Meeting yesterday, shareholders urged the company to diversify to bio-fuel and optimise its earnings from carbon credits trade. . . .
Earlier this month, a British anti-tobacco lobby known as ASH said in a report that profit achieved by the global tobacco company in Africa was causing ill health and deaths.
The ASH said while smoking is declining in the West, BAT's profits in Asia and Africa grew by £2 million to £470 million last year. But BAT corporate and regulatory affairs manager for sub-Saharan Africa Keith Gretton refuted the claims saying BAT's profit in Europe grew from £781 million to £842 million last year-an increase of over £60 million.
On behalf of 22 health groups, ASH will be meeting the Exchequer Secretary, Angela Eagle today to present plans on tackling smuggling and raising tobacco taxes, ahead of the forthcoming Budget. [1] ASH and more than 20 other health groups are calling on the Chancellor to: • Re-introduce the real price escalator to raise the tax on tobacco by at least 10p per pack above the rate of inflation [2] • Maintain the 5% VAT on nicotine replacement therapies that was introduced in last year’s Budget (the tax was reduced from 17.5% as an incentive to increase uptake) • Implement a revised anti-smuggling strategy with challenging new targets
British American Tobacco (BAT) has been in Africa since 1902. The shareholders at the London meeting had reason to celebrate; the company made a pretax profit of more than $4.5 billion last year. But Action on Smoking and Health, a non-profit group that works to eliminate the harm caused by tobacco, used the opportunity to protest the company's growing presence in Africa.
Group spokesman Martin Dockrell says African countries are experiencing the highest increase in tobacco use among developing countries.
"The shareholders are meeting in London today to count their profits," he said. "They sold 1.1 billion cigarettes in Africa and the Middle East region last year, and we are not so happy because by our calculation that is equivalent to about 100,000 deaths."
Dockrell says since smoking is on the decline in the West due to pressure by organizations like his and the general public's awareness of the health implications of smoking, companies such as BAT have shifted their focus to Africa and Asia with aggressive advertising. . . .
BAT responded with a written statement saying Action on Smoking and Health's facts just do not stand up. It also dismissed the charge it is breaking into emerging markets to dodge regulation, since it has been in those markets for more than 100 years and abides by the laws and regulations of all the countries it operates in.
The company says the health risks associated with smoking are well-known and warnings about the hazard are printed on every single pack of cigarettes it makes whether the law requires it or not.
Contrary to the obituary in today's New York Times, former Surgeon General Dr. William H. Stewart did not "put the first health warnings on cigarette packs," notes the public interest law professor who caused the first decline in US smoking by getting free time for antismoking messages on radio and TV.
"Although Dr. Stewart urged health warnings, he had no authority to order them," notes law professor John Banzhaf of George Washington University. In fact, the story is somewhat more complicated, he explains. . . .
Unfortunately, something that Stewart could not have anticipated -- but which Congress should have foreseen -- occurred. Years later the major tobacco companies were successful in defending themselves from law suits claiming that they failed to adequately disclose the dangers of smoking by arguing that they put on their packs exactly the warning Congress had required.
None of this should detract from Stewart's legacy, however, says Banzhaf.
As British American Tobacco celebrates 100 years of trade in Africa at its AGM in London (on Wednesday, 30th April), campaigners will be outside, protesting about the heavy footprint it leaves on the continent - death, hunger, poverty, and environmental destruction.
A new report by ASH, BAT's African Footprint [1], says that while smoking is declining in the West, BAT's profits in Asia and Africa grew by £2 million to £470 million last year. The growth in sales means more ill-health and ultimately rising tobacco-related deaths.
According to an analysis carried out for the campaigning charity ASH, one person dies for every million cigarettes sold. BAT sold 101 billion cigarettes in the Africa and Middle east region last year. Sir Richard Peto, Professor of Medical Statistics at Oxford University said: "If BAT continues selling 100 billion cigarettes a year in Africa and the Middle East, this will, in the long run, cause 100,000 deaths per year."
The government will launch a public consultation next month on its plans to tighten legislation on the sale of tobacco - but new research reveals that people, including smokers, are already demanding more action.
A poll carried out for ASH revealed that:
- 76% of GB adults support a ban on smoking in cars carrying children under the age of 18, - 85% of adults in England and Wales want retailers who are convicted of selling tobacco illegally to children to be banned from selling tobacco products, and - 88% of adults in Scotland agree that businesses found to have sold or supplied tobacco to under-18s more than once should have their right to sell tobacco suspended.
Deborah Arnott, Director of the health campaigning charity ASH, said:
"The hypocrisy of the industry knows no bounds. While complaining bitterly about tax increases the manufacturers have been raising the price of cigarettes to fill their own coffers while hiding behind the screen of tax rises. While we approve of tobacco prices being high, the profits should go to the Government for redistribution into the health service, not to the tobacco industry. "
Contrary to tobacco industry propaganda, there is widespread public support for raising tobacco taxes
"These studies provide even stronger proof that nicotine is a drug which causes physiological addiction in the same way as heroin or cocaine, and that the addiction can be even stronger than with these and other illegal drugs.
The fact that some 60% of the population has at least one copy of this double whammy gene is consistent with the view that nicotine in addictive to over 60% of the population, but not to everyone," says Professor John Banzhaf of ASH.
These studies may one day open the door to more effective smoking cessation programs, which today have an abysmal success rate.
On the other hand, since quitting involves overcoming both a physiological addiction to nicotine and a psychological habituation to using cigarettes in many every-day stressful-and-otherwise situations, even major improvements in the addictive component will have only a limited impact, says Banzhaf, noting that smokers who are given nicotine replacement therapy in the form of gums and pills still have major problems giving up smoking.
June 7-8, 2008 in Washington, DC, USA
writing contest
Sponsored by the National Center for Nonsmokers' Rights and Law Professor John Banzhaf . . .
■ Features presentations and discussions of new legal and law-related actions to protect nonsmokers' rights
■ There are a limited number of $1000 travel grants to attend -- Preference will be given to early applicants
■ Will include an introduction to three (3) powerful but often overlooked weapons to protect nonsmokers:
● The Framework Convention on Tobacco Control [FCTC], the world's first antismoking and nonsmokers' rights treaty ● The Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA), which can provide protection for very sensitive nonsmokers ● The Convention on the Rights of Persons With Disabilities and its Optional Protocol, an even newer international treaty
THE chief executive of ASH Scotland has called for stop smoking services to be made more accessible ahead of No Smoking Day tomorrow.
Sheila Duffy welcomed the 25th anniversary of the event aimed at persuading more people to try and quit.
However, she also stressed the need to make sure people had access to support and advice all year round.
In a letter to state health commissioners, the group Action on Smoking and Health (ASH) suggested that bringing suits against physicians could be an effective way to save lives.
A recent study found that at least 42,000 lives could be saved annually if doctors followed federal guidelines for treating smokers.
The government has put together a 196-page guideline for docs advising them what to do with patients who smoke -- what to say, which drugs to use, etc. The key point: it's not enough to say "you should probably quit" and leave it at that.
As so often happens, New York is leading the way. Check out their project.