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** 15 September 2020
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** UK
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** North East: Warning issued over dangers of secondhand smoke (#1)
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** Wales: Who bankrolls your MP's election campaigns? The donations, extra income and free trips Wales' 40 MPs receive (#2)
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** Scotland Opinion: We must reduce smoking in all our communities (#3)
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** International
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** Australia: We cannot ignore mental illness prevention in a COVID-19 world (#4)
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** US Study: Cigarette smoking linked to worse outcomes in patients treated for bladder cancer (#5)
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** UK
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** Fresh, the North East regional tobacco control office, has launched a ‘Secondhand Smoke is Poison’ campaign which encourages people to visit [link removed] for tips and support to stop smoking, or at least take their smoke outside to protect their families.

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** New figures suggest more than half of smokers are smoking inside the home around others, including children and adult non-smokers – putting their health at risk from secondhand smoke. The North East survey found 54% of smokers were smoking in the home when others are around, with 28% doing it daily while 10% of the time children are present. Children who live in a household with a smoker are much more likely to develop asthma, chest infections like pneumonia and bronchitis, meningitis, ear infections, coughs and cold.

Ailsa Rutter OBE, Director of Fresh, said: “No-one wants to put their family at risk, but it is clear that COVID has created its own pressures, with more families at home together. We recognise that nearly all smokers get hooked during childhood and the power of this addiction, with many keen to quit but who struggle to do so. The best thing anyone who smokes can do right now for their health and their family’s health is to stop smoking completely – but if you find you can’t quit then take it right outside, away from other household members.”

She went on to say, “Secondhand smoke is full of health-damaging poisons such as carbon monoxide and because of the way it drifts and lingers, opening the window or back door does very little to protect people’s health. Quitting or taking it completely outside is the only way.”

Source: News Post Leader, 14 September 2020
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** Many MPs and their constituency associations receive significant sums or gifts in kind from their own and their party's supporters to fund election campaigns. MPs have to declare anything over £1,500 (or over £500 if the MP has received over £1,500 in value from that source in the calendar year). They must declare any gift or benefit over £300, which are usually tickets or hospitality.

Welsh MPs have received significant gifts and donations including from the tobacco industry. For example, Simon Hart, current Welsh secretary, accepted two tickets to the Chelsea Flower show worth £1,404 from Japan Tobacco International in May 2014.

Just three months before that, Hart was one of only 24 MPs who voted against tabled amendments to the Children and Families Bill. The Bill would enable the UK government to introduce regulations to require plain packaging for tobacco products; make it an offence to sell e-cigarettes to children under 18 and make it an offence for an adult to buy cigarettes for anyone under the age of 18. Mr Hart had previously expressed serious concerns about plain packaging as one of 50 MPs to write to former Health Secretary Andrew Landsley.

Alun Cairns, former Welsh Secretary, also received two tickets for the Chelsea Flower Show in both 2011 and 2012 worth over £2,200, from a Japanese tobacco company. This was at the same time he voted against a bill banning smoking in cars carrying children and vocally opposed plain packaging on cigarettes.

Source: Wales Online, 13 September 2020
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** Sheila Duffy, chief executive of ASH Scotland, shares her opinions on what the Government needs to do to achieve its 2034 target of reducing smoking prevalence to 5%. She states that the government needs to take urgent action to end smoking-associated health inequalities and the epidemic of poor health caused by commercial products like tobacco. She highlights that there is a need for bold policy decisions, and that the Scottish government has the tools and power to make those decisions.

ASH Scotland has joined with partners to call on the next Scottish Government to follow a prevention agenda that will tackle health inequalities ahead of the Scottish elections next year. Furthermore, she calls on policy makers to look at the pricing and availability of cigarettes and at the support that needs to be in place to help people quit.

Sheila says, “ASH Scotland is committed to pushing the Scottish Government to make good on its tobacco control promises and increasing the effort that is surely required if we are to meet the 2034 target of reducing smoking prevalence to five percent in Scotland.”

She concludes by saying: “It will be a travesty if we achieve it by eradicating smoking in wealthy areas, whilst leaving a prevailing crisis amongst our most disenfranchised.”

Source: Holyrood, 11 September 2020

See also: Non-Communicable Disease Prevention. A manifesto for the next Parliament: Addressing Scotland’s biggest killers through action on societal factors that cause ill-health. ([link removed])
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** International
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** Writing in the Conversation Stephen Carbone, Honorary, School for Population and Global Health, University of Melbourne discusses the mental health impact of COVID-19.

Stephen highlights that during the COVID-19 pandemic, there has been an increase in demand for mental health services which federal and state governments have supported by providing more mental health support. He notes that while this additional support is vital more needs to be done to prevent mental health problems developing.

He points out that Australia needs to have a mental health prevention plan that will focus on preventing mental health conditions, that constitute a significant risk factor for suicide, and not just improving mental health services alone. He highlights that a comprehensive mental health prevention strategy should include a focus “on physical activity, healthy eating, and reducing smoking which will help to promote good mental as well as physical health.”

Stephen calls on the government to “strengthen the factors that buffer people against stress and tackle the underlying factors that contribute to poor mental health ”during and after COVID-19.

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** Source: The Conversation, 14 September 2020
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** According to a systematic review and meta-analysis study by Keck Medicine of University of Southern California (USC), patients treated for bladder cancer with a surgery known as radical cystectomy have worse outcomes if they are smokers.

The researchers reviewed 17 studies that reported on the impact of tobacco smoking on chemotherapy response and survival outcomes of 13,777 patients following radical cystectomy. Of these patients, 40.8% were active smokers at the time of the surgery, 14.1% former smokers and 45.1% were non/never smokers at the time of surgery.

Findings from the study reveal that active smokers responded worse to chemotherapy and had higher mortality rates, both in general and specifically from bladder cancer, and a higher rate of bladder cancer recurrence than patients who never smoked or were not smoking at the time of surgery. Former smokers also fared worse in these categories than those who had never smoked, though the differences were less significant.

The study authors recommend that health care professionals advise bladder cancer patients to stop smoking. They also suggest that future studies or clinical trials involving bladder cancer chart patients’ smoking status to create a more accurate picture of what factors affect cancer survival and recurrence.

Source: News Medical Life Science, 14 September 2020

See also: The Journal of Urology- Association between Smoking Exposure, Neoadjuvant Chemotherapy Response and Survival Outcomes following Radical Cystectomy: Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis. The Journal of Urology. ([link removed])
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For more information call 020 7404 0242, email [email protected] (mailto:[email protected]) or visit www.ash.org.uk

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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