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Viewers of ITV drama Des have complained that their "lungs hurt" due to all of the smoking in the show, which is set in the 1980s and based on the conviction of murderer Dennis Nilsen.
But while the details of Nilsen’s killings were enough to turn anyone’s stomach, for some viewers it was the amount of smoking that shocked them.
Nilsen himself is portrayed as a chain smoker, with his biographer Brian Masters (Jason Watkins) keeping him well stocked in 20-packs. The DCI, played by Daniels Mays, is no better, smoking at every given opportunity despite the location.
One viewer said: “Des is just one long smoking advert!”
A second said: “Smoking in every scene seems a bit unnecessary.”
A third posted: “As a former smoker, it’s genuinely upsetting me how much these actors are smoking in #Des. It’s making my lungs hurt just watching.”
Another wrote: "A good 70% of Des so far is people lighting their cigs and smoking."
Actors such as Keanu Reeves have previously discussed how they have become addicted to smoking after portraying smoking characters on screen.
Source: Daily Star, 15 September 2020
See also:
Daily Mail: 'I started smoking at 30 and now I can't stop': Keanu Reeves reveals the bad habits picked up on films sets
The Sun: Serial killer Dennis Nilsen revealed his final victim was his budgie who was killed by passive weed smoke
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Writing in the British Medical Journal (BMJ), Anna Gilmore, Director of the Tobacco Control Research Group at the University of Bath, highlights the confusion around the relative risk of heated tobacco products – such as Philip Morris’s IQOS – an electronic cigarettes (e-cigarettes) compared to cigarettes. Gilmore attributes much of this confusion to the conflation of these products by Philip Morris in particular.
She points out that e-cigarettes contain no tobacco, can help smokers to quit and are considered “a less harmful alternative to smoking for those who switch fully”. In contrast, IQOS “has not been shown to enable quitting or to be significantly lower risk than smoking.”
She argues that the US Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) decision to include tobacco under its poorly worded “modified risk tobacco product” criteria – despite IQOS being denied risk modification status – escalates this confusion, and allowed Philip Morris to misrepresent the decision as a “milestone for public health” and use the decision to push other governments to open their markets to or relax rules regulating IQOS.
Gilmore states that there is “little role for heated tobacco products at either individual or population level” and encourages smokers seeking to reduce harm to use more established products such as pharmaceutical nicotine, and use heated tobacco products as a “last resort.”
She highlights Philip Morris’ own admission that: “It has not been demonstrated that switching to the iQOS system reduces the risk of developing tobacco-related diseases compared to smoking cigarettes.” Gilmore concludes by encouraging governments to regulate heated tobacco products as tobacco products and calls on the FDA to make its terminology clearer to “ensure products which meet only reduced exposure criteria cannot be misrepresented as reduced harm.”
Source: British Medical Journal, 16 September 2020
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Had Covid-19 never happened, global filter cigarette sales in 2020, by value, could be expected to be 8% higher than they will be, a difference of US$56bn to the industry, according to leading data and analytics company GlobalData.
For plain cigarettes, the disparity increased to 11%, and in niche categories like chewing tobacco, it rose as high as a 13% drop in expected sales. GlobalData’s findings seem to corroborate what others, such as University College London, have found recently; a significant number of people have quit smoking during the pandemic. But why are they quitting? The two main themes are health and economics.
Health is an obvious reason for quitting, supported by many government and charitable organizations. As Covid-19 attacks the lungs, so many smokers have, at least temporarily, quit smoking to protect themselves. Evidence on smoking and its relationship with Covid-19 is complex and developing, but medical authorities typically advise that smokers have an increased risk of respiratory infection and more severe symptoms when infected, even if nicotine has some mitigating effect.
Depending on the country, some medical authorities, such as the UK’s NHS recommend a move to vaping to mitigate risk.
GlobalData’s Covid-19 week 7 recovery consumer survey, combining answers “it will get a bit worse” and “it will get significantly worse” found that 44% of global consumers expect the economic situations in their countries to get worse. As recessions bite, consumers tend to try and save money wherever they can, and so quitting smoking may simply be a means to that end for many.
GlobalData also found that around 8% of global consumers intend to stop buying cigarette tobacco and tobacco alternatives as they are beyond their shopping budgets. Further analysis revealed that millennials were more likely than any other group to give this answer.
Despite the recorded increase in quitting, tobacco, especially cigarettes, remain big business and extremely profitable. Filter cigarettes remain the largest sellers, and in 2020 will account for a sales value of US$651bn, although it will be down from the baseline of US$707bn.
Source: Verdict, 11 September 2020
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PQs: Tobacco imports and excise duties
PQ1: Asked by Emily Thornberry Labour, Islington South and Finsbury
To ask the Secretary of State for International Trade, what information her Department holds on the 10 largest source countries for tobacco leaf imports into the UK in the last 12 months for which figures are available; what volumes were imported from those countries; and what tariff rates are set to apply to imports of tobacco leaf from those countries from 1 January 2021.
PQ2: Asked by Emily Thornberry Labour, Islington South and Finsbury
To ask the Secretary of State for International Trade, what assessment the Government has made of the effect on the UK tobacco manufacturing industry of the imposition of the UK Global Tariff on imports of tobacco leaf from 1 January 2021.
PQ3: Asked by Emily Thornberry Labour, Islington South and Finsbury
To ask the Secretary of State for International Trade, what assessment the Government has made of the effect on (a) the average prices, (b) consumption and (c) tax revenues deriving from the sale of duty-paid tobacco products in the UK as a result of the imposition of the UK Global Tariff on imports of tobacco leaf from 1 January 2021.
PQ4: Asked by Emily Thornberry Labour, Islington South and Finsbury
To ask the Secretary of State for International Trade, what assessment the Government has made of the effect of the imposition of the UK Global Tariff on imports of tobacco leaf from 1 January 2021 on forecast levels of smuggling of counterfeit and other tobacco products into the UK.
Answered by Greg Hands, Minister of State for Trade Policy
Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (HMRC) remains committed to promoting compliance and tackling avoidance and evasion. Guidance on how to not facilitate smuggling of tobacco products is available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/vat-notice-477-tobacco-products-duty-control-of-supply-chains/excise-notice-477-tobacco-products-duty-control-of-supply-chains-1.
In addition, on 12 July 2020, we announced more than £705m in additional funding to make sure our border systems are robust and operational.
We will publish more analysis in the Tax Information and Impact Note (TIIN) alongside the legislation, as is standard practice.
Source: Hansard, 16 September 2020
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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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