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** 26 April 2024
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** UK
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** ‘Wholly unrealistic’ NHSE financial recovery policy risks ‘significant harm’ warns ICS (#3)
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** Opinion: UK smoking ban would have many benefits for public health – but only if it’s effectively implemented (#6)
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** Shop temporarily closed after selling illegal vapes (#4)
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** Links of the week
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** Register now for the e-cig summit Wednesday May 14th (#8)
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** Smoking hasn’t run out of puff yet — the Times archive shows why (#5)
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** UK
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** ‘Wholly unrealistic’ NHSE financial recovery policy risks ‘significant harm’ warns ICS

Leaders of an integrated care system in the Midlands have warned they cannot make the scale of staffing cuts required to balance the books without putting patients at risk.

Indicative analysis produced by Staffordshire and Stoke-on-Trent Integrated Care Board also found its provider trusts would have to cut 10 per cent of their workforce to break even.

This would equate to 2,300 posts across University Hospitals North Midlands, Midlands Partnership Foundation Trust and North Staffordshire Combined Healthcare, while the ICB would have to cancel a “very high proportion” of third-sector contracts.

The document says this “would bring our teams below safe staffing levels” and have a “profound effect on our ability to deliver safe services”.

Staffordshire and Stoke-on-Trent Integrated Care System – which includes the three trusts and the ICB – is looking at a £130m deficit for the current year, after posting a £90m deficit in 2023-24.

NHS England policy requires breakeven each year, but the ICS appears to be in negotiations with it about setting a deficit plan for 2024-25.

Paul Brown, the ICS chief finance officer, said the system was currently holding “escalation” meetings with the regional and national teams.

Mr Brown said the ICS had begun a recovery plan to get back to breakeven over a multi-year period, pointing to a provider collaborative that had begun to make savings in Continuing Healthcare.

However, he said it was “not possible” to take cash out quickly and the ICS would take several years to get back to balance.

“In the short term, that means our financial position is extremely difficult… The latest submission is about [a] £130m [deficit], we’re struggling to get much further if we’re to deliver all the operating targets.”

Source: HSJ, 23 April 2024
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** Opinion: UK smoking ban would have many benefits for public health – but only if it’s effectively implemented

Writing in The Conversation, Andrew Lee, Professor of Public Health at the University of Sheffield discusses the public health benefits of the Tobacco and Vapes Bill as well as the possible risks to its success.

Lee writes that smoking remains the leading cause of preventable ill-health and death across the world and in the England alone is responsible for around 64,000 deaths a year.

The author states that quitting smoking at any age is good for your health, but “the effect is greatest if young people are prevented from smoking in the first place”. With this in mind, limiting the number of people who can smoke will “will have considerable public health benefits – both in the short-term and long-term, and for both smokers and non-smokers”.

Lee notes that a ban by itself is not sufficient to eliminate smoking. The ban will need to be backed up by an enforcement strategy. He adds that a comprehensive package of measures is required to support the ban, this could include education, mass media campaigns and extending the ban on smoking in public places.

Lee concludes by saying that tobacco control measures between 1998 and 2010 may have helped save the lives of 210,000 people but that an estimated 500,000 people may die by 2030 unless more action is taken.

Source: The Conversation, 23 April 2024

See also: Smokefree Action Coalition - Smokefree Generation FAQs ([link removed])
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** Shop temporarily closed after selling illegal vapes

A shop has been ordered to close for two months after it was found stocking illegal vapes for a third time.

Officers from Durham County Council found more than 1,500 of the vapes, worth in excess of £16,000, at a shop in Bishop Auckland.

Vapes must be registered and the tank sizes limited to 2ml under regulations.

Gary Carr, the council’s strategic regulation manager, said he hoped the closure order would "serve as a warning to any shops tempted to trade in illegal products".

Newton Aycliffe magistrates heard that the owner of the shop had been given advice in October 2021, when council officers were sold a product which did not comply with regulations during a test purchase.

In an inspection of the shop in June 2023, 871 non-compliant vapes were seized and found to be worth about £8,700.

The owner was issued a warning and given further guidance.

In January this year, the council seized a further 746 vapes, worth about £7,500, along with an associated vehicle.

The council then consulted with the public, retailers and a local school, who all supported a potential closure order.

The shop owner apologised in an email response to the consultation, adding that he was deeply ashamed of his actions and was an honest person who made mistakes.

Source: BBC news, 25 April 2024
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** Links of the week
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** Register now for the e-cig summit Wednesday May 14th

Register now online or in person for the US e-cig summit which will provide participants with research evidence and policy analysis on vaping from UK, US and global experts. The Summit will be live-streamed and videos of speaker presentations and panel discussions will be added to the Summit app within 48 hours of the live event for delegates. The app will be live for 3 months after the event for all registered delegates.

Register here: [link removed]
Programme here: [link removed]
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Register Here ([link removed] )


** Smoking hasn’t run out of puff yet — the Times archive shows why

Rishi Sunak’s smoking ban was passed by MPs in Westminster by 383 votes to 67 this month. The Tobacco and Vapes Bill will make it illegal for anyone born after 2008 to buy cigarettes, a landmark policy to create a “smoke-free generation”. The Times criticised the MPs who opposed the legislation, noting that “many were defending a killer, not individual liberty”.

In 1927 The Times reported on comments made by the surgeon Sir Arbuthnot Lane alleging that pipe-smoking caused cancer. At the 1927 Tobacco Trade exhibition Sir Bruce Potter gave a stern defence, claiming that it was in fact the misuse of old churchwarden pipes, not the tobacco itself, causing health problems. Hailing the solace to be found in pipe-smoking, he argued: “There would be less room in the world for misery which now existed if employer and employee could more frequently be brought to discuss their differences round a table over a pipe of tobacco.”

This article features pictures from the Times archive from the previous century.

Source: The Times, 26 April 2024
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ASH Daily News is a digest of published news on smoking-related topics. ASH is not responsible for the content of external websites. ASH does not necessarily endorse the material contained in this bulletin.

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