ASH Daily News for 01 July 2008

Smoking costs the Earth too

It's a year since smoking was banned from enclosed public places but another threat may have been made worse as a result of the legislation. In Britain, cigarettes are the principal source of street litter, accounting for 70 to 90 per cent in urban areas. And they're just as bad for our planet's health as our own. 

'Anyone walking down the street these days, especially around bars and clubs, will see streets awash with cigarette ends,' says Ginette Unsworth, spokeswoman for Keep Britain Tidy. 'Since the introduction of the smoking ban last July, we've seen a 43 per cent increase in cigarette litter on our streets. People don't always think of butts as proper litter,' she continues. 'Smokers who might not drop any other kind of litter drop cigarette ends because they don't want to set a bin alight and because they think the ends will biodegrade. But they don't and they can cause huge problems.'

Most smokers are under the impression that cigarette filters are made of cotton. Instead, they are made from packed fibres of cellulose acetate and take up to a decade to break down. Filters also trap formaldehyde, hydrogen cyanide and 'tar' - which is the residue of some of the 160 other chemicals in a cigarette.

All of this finds its way into the environment. Cigarette butts on the streets wash away into drains and rivers, and reach our oceans. Worldwide, they're the most common item of beach litter. Last July, the Marine Conservation Society (MCS) teamed up with Surfers Against Sewage (SAS) and naturist campaigners in Brighton for the No Butts On The Beach! campaign, giving away pocket ashtrays on a naturist beach to highlight the issue. 'We have documented cases where they've been found in the guts of whales, dolphins, seabirds, fish and turtles,' says Emma Snowden, MCS litter projects co-ordinator.

'Filters also absorb tar and chemicals that can leach into the water. Some experiments have shown that just one cigarette filter is toxic enough to kill water fleas in eight litres of water. That gives an idea of the potential impact it can have.' Growing tobacco is also damaging. It's a chemical-heavy process, using vast quantities of fertiliser, herbicides and pesticides, much of which washes away into the environment. The soil is commonly fumigated with methyl bromide, an ozone-depleting chemical, before seedlings are planted.

'A lot of tobacco companies say they give farmers the best protection but that's often not the case,' says Amanda Sandford, research manager at Action on Smoking and Health (ASH). Tobacco growing and curing processes are a major cause of deforestation, which, in turn, causes erosion. More tobacco crops also mean fewer food crops are being grown, says Sandford. 'It's a profitable crop for tobacco companies but not that profitable for farmers, because they tend to be caught in a system that tobacco companies impose on them. They don't often make a decent living out of it.' These issues might surprise smokers, Sandford suggests. 'Many just see the effect of smoking as litter on the street,' she says. 'People might be less likely to smoke if they're fully aware of the environmental, as well as the health, factors.'

Source: The Metro, 30 June 2008
Link: http://tiny.cc/Tz5Ne

Smoke free one year on

One year after the country took a dark turn into state control and an unpleasant, puerile attitude to other people's business. Or is it one year into a brave new world where the country became fitter, healthier and more civilised? One year since the smoking ban in England and Wales, and passions remain high on both sides.

"Plainly it's been a huge success," says Martin Dockrell, policy manager for ASH. "Not only has there been very little need for enforcement, because compliance was so high, but the benefits have been coming in thick and fast. It's indisputably the big political success of the year. It's just gone on getting more and more popular. These people who oppose it are pretty damn noisy, but they're outnumbered ten-to-one by those who support it."

One of those noisy people is Neil Rafferty, a spokesman for FOREST, the pro-smoking group. "For smokers, it's been a pretty rough year," he says. "A huge chunk of their lives has transformed dramatically. They can no longer socialise in the way they wanted to. ASH will say Britain is a healthier place. But the underlining point of that is they think health is more important than anything else. We think happiness and freedom is just as important, if not more important," he adds. "The debate in this country has become so hysterical that we're now in an atmosphere where freedoms are being thrown away every day because of this religious fervour of the Labour party and their campaign allies."

The civil liberties argument received a fair amount of attention in the build-up to the ban, but anti-smoking campaigners don't think it stands up. "It's pretty straightforward," says Mr Dockrell. "John Stuart Mill said people were free to do whatever they like as long as they don't hurt anyone else. While we thought smoking in public was harmless, it was fine. But once the evidence about the harm from second-hand smoke became pretty conclusive the argument changed. Your freedom to swing your fist ends where my face begins."

But FOREST contests the evidence the passive-smoking argument is based on. "This is double-speak from ASH," says Mr Rafferty. "The reason they pushed for the ban was because they felt it would contribute to the de-normalisation of smoking. That was why they wanted to ban it. It has nothing to do with protecting bar staff. There's no evidence bar staff are badly affected by smoking. They claimed 50 bar staff a year are dying from passive smoking in Scotland, but they've yet to name one. They simply have not presented any credible evidence at all. There are still plenty of environments where you're exposed to carcinogens. Cooking red meat in a restaurant exposes you. Road workers are being subjected to a huge cocktail of lethal poisons, but do you ever see them using face masks?"

The battle isn't over yet, either. The Department of Health (DH) is in consultation on a wide range of anti-tobacco measures designed to tackle underage smoking and cut down on demand. Proposals are being aired to ban cigarette vending machines, hide point-of-sale displays of ten packs and put photo warnings on packets. The proposals give a fairly good indication of the priorities of health groups like ASH.

"People are still being exposed to second hand smoke, especially outside of offices," Mr Dockrell explains. "Their right to smoke does not trump my right not to smoke. But the idea of smoke-free outside areas isn't the big issue. Once you're in the open air there's much less evidence of harm. We want to constrain the opportunities tobacco companies have."

It's been one year, and no one needs telling the difference it's made. Not just in terms of smell, or huddles of people shivering outside in the winter, but also a marked change in the perennial argument between health and pleasure. Whichever side of the argument people ended on, the smoking ban opened the doors to further changes in legislation. Barely a day of news passes without mention of fatty foods, alcohol, smoking or lack of physical activity. Britain is becoming obsessed with health and the battle over the government's role in addressing it isn't over yet.

Source: politics.co.uk, 01 July 2008
Link: http://tiny.cc/8JE4c

Smoke free law not guilty of alcohol slump

A recent study has revealed that the sharp decline of alcohol sales over the past year is not entirely due to the smoking ban. Since the smoking ban was introduced a year ago, on-trade alcohol sales have fallen by over eight per cent in England and Wales, with food sales barely, if at all, compensating for the decline. But figures released by market company Nielsen, reveal that less than half of the drop can be attributed to the smoking ban.

Neilsen claim that last year’s wet summer certainly added to the downturn, but property company Christie & Co. blame a number of other factors as well. A spokesperson for Christie said: “The Government has not helped the industry by continuing to raise alcohol duty rates and by allowing the supermarkets to continue to sell beer and alcohol at heavily discounted prices.

“This, combined with the widely reported problems in the financial markets, and accelerating inflation, has led to something of a ‘perfect storm’ for the pub sector.” Wine sales however do not seem to have been affected so much, benefiting from the ‘increasing importance of food and women to the on-trade’.

Source: big hospitality, 30 June 2008
Link: http://tiny.cc/KyWEB

Smoke free extends to mental health units

The smoking ban is being extended to the buildings and grounds of mental health hospitals in England. The sites were given an extra year to bring the smoking ban into effect to help patients quit the habit. The Department of Health says the law goes "towards ending an unacceptable health inequality". Mind, the mental health charity, says inpatients must be given more support and offered recreational services to replace the social aspect of smoking.

Charities have been campaigning for more help and support to those patients who want to stop smoking. According to Mind, 70% of people in mental health inpatient units smoke. And 51% of people with bipolar disorder smoke 20 cigarettes a day, compared to just 8% of the general population smoking at this level, the charity adds.

Sophie Corlett, Mind's Policy Director says that mental health inpatients are the only group not allowed to smoke in their own living quarters and many of them smoke to pass the time or to socialise. She said: "Hospitals need to provide people with alternative recreational facilities and opportunities to socialise once smoking is no longer an option."

A spokesman for the Royal College of Nursing, Ian Hulatt, says that someone having a major psychotic episode would find it very difficult to quit smoking, but the ban is a move in the right direction. He said: "It's a difficult ban to implement but with help and cessation clinics, changes will happen. It will take time but it will be a positive outcome. "Mental health hospitals should not be excluded from the ban. It would be bad to perpetuate an unhealthy habit such as smoking."

Source: BBC News, 01 July 2008
Link: http://tiny.cc/ck11Q

Dutch smoking ban: No tobacco in your joints, cafes ordered

Dutch coffee shops, long considered as synonymous with the Netherlands as tulips or attacking football, face a new challenge from today when a ban on smoking tobacco in restaurants and cafes comes into effect. The owners claim the law, which will allow customers to light up potent tobacco-free pure cannabis joints but ban milder spliffs in which tobacco is mixed with cannabis, threatens to put hundreds of them out of business.

"It's a bit like saying to someone you can go into a cafe and you can buy a beer, but you can't drink it there - you'll have to stick to whisky, rum and vodka," said Paul Wilhelm, owner of De Tweede Kamer, a popular Amsterdam coffee shop. As most patrons prefer milder joints in which cannabis is mixed with tobacco, and only 18% favour much stronger, pure cannabis spliffs, the fear is that the days of the coffee shops could be numbered. The catering industry said 1,600 coffee shops across the country were up for sale because their owners were convinced their businesses were doomed.

Wilhelm, who has run his cafe since 1985, said the law was in danger of "tearing the heart out" of Amsterdam's social life. "The focus of the De Tweede Kamer has always been social contact," he added. "They'll destroy that with what I see as a ridiculous law." Mark Jacobsen, chairman of the BCD, a nationwide association of coffee shop owners, said proper implementation of the law would require inspectors to check each cannabis joint for tobacco content. "It's absurd. In other countries they look to see whether you have marijuana in your cigarette, here they'll look to see if you've got cigarette in your marijuana."

The Food and Consumer Product Safety Authority, which is responsible for enforcing the ban, said it had trained around 200 inspectors. "They can tell the difference between a mix or a pure joint from its smell and appearance," said a spokesman. Some coffee shop owners have sought alternative ways to deal with the conundrum and allow their clientele to still enjoy a tobacco-free cannabis spliff without it being too strong. One inventor, who calls himself Evert, is doing a roaring trade in £400 vapourisers - in which hashish or cannabis is heated to 180C and the resulting steam is directed into a balloon from which smokers inhale. The vapouriser is claimed to be the mildest way to consume pure cannabis.

While some cafes have said they will simply lay on more pure cannabis brownies or "space cakes", others have built smoking chambers within their premises which are off-limits to staff. Some are also providing alternatives to tobacco, such as the herb coltsfoot. Martial von Beenkom, owner of Boerejongens (Young Farmers) on the outskirts of Amsterdam, has turned his cafe into a smoke-free tea salon where he will sell cannabis on a takeaway basis. "Most people come here to buy their grass which they then smoke elsewhere," he said. The health minister, Ab Klink, said the law would stay, arguing that as well as helping to improve people's health it might help to stamp out idleness. "Consumers who spend the whole day hanging out in coffee shops will find other things to do," he said.

Source: The Guardian, 01 July 2008
Link: http://tiny.cc/wlBEr

Northern Ireland: Tobacco buying age to rise to 18

Health Minister Michael McGimpsey has announced that the legal age at which people can buy tobacco products will rise from 16 to 18. The change will come into force on 1 September. "It is clear that we must do all we can to deter our children and young people from taking up the smoking habit," said Mr McGimpsey. "Smoking kills and I want that message to be heard loud and clear by our children and young people."

The minister also outlined other measures he is taking to deter young people from taking up the habit. "I understand that raising the age of sale will not, in itself, solve the problems of children's smoking. It is one step along the way," he said. "Education programmes and promotional campaigns, highlighting the dangers of smoking, will of course continue."

Dr Colin Hamilton, chair of the BMA's Public Health Committee in Northern Ireland, welcomed the announcement. "This will go some way to saving the lives of many people who frequently take up smoking when too young to be concerned about its life threatening consequences," he said.

Source: BBC News, 30 June 2008
Link: http://tiny.cc/Ts8X5