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** 16 April 2021
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** UK
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** Matt Hancock received shares in family’s firm that won NHS contract (#1)
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** Around 31,000 heart and circulatory deaths attributed to excess weight and obesity every year, warns BHF (#2)
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** International
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** New Zealand aims to create a smokefree generation (#3)
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** Spain considers banning smoking on all terraces (#4)
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** US: Make covid casino smoking ban permanent in New Jersey (#5)
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** Links of the Week
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** Webinar: Brexit Governance: The implications of the UK’s new governance arrangements for trade and health policies (#6)
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** Recruitment: Project Manager Tobacco Dependency, British Thoracic Society (BTS) (#7)
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** UK
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** Health secretary, Matt Hancock, omitted to declare his connection to a company owned by his close family, despite it winning a place on a framework to provide services to the English NHS in 2019 and contracts with the NHS in Wales.

Topwood Ltd, which specialises in secure waste disposal, successfully won a tender competition to secure a place on an NHS Shared Business Services framework for “confidential waste destruction and disposal” at the beginning of 2019. Mr Hancock was appointed health and social care secretary in July 2018. The company, which is now based in Wrexham, Wales, was then owned by Mr Hancock’s sister, his mother, and two men thought to be their spouses.

There is no suggestion Mr Hancock was involved in any contract awards, but the ministerial code says ministers have a “personal responsibility… to decide whether and what action is needed to avoid a conflict or the perception of a conflict.” Mr Hancock has not declared this interest in any of the published ministerial interests’ declarations of recent years. In the December 2017 declaration (a time when he was culture secretary), he declared only that his brother was the chief executive officer of Crowd2Fund (an investment platform). In later declarations — in March 2019, December 2019 and July 2020 — he declared no interests.

In the last month, he has declared in the Commons members register of interests that he now owns shares in Topwood, under a “delegated management arrangement.” It also reported two contracts awarded to the firm by a Welsh NHS board last month, but the Welsh NHS is not the UK government’s responsibility. Papers lodged at Companies House show that Mr Hancock’s mother and Bob Carter transferred 10 shares each on 1 February this year and that Mr Hancock now owns 20 shares.

A government spokesperson said: “Mr Hancock has acted entirely properly in these circumstances. All declarations of interest have been made in accordance with the ministerial code. Ministers have no involvement in the awarding of these contracts, and no conflict of interest arises.”

Source: HSJ, 15 April 2021

See also: The Times - Hancock’s shares in NHS shredding business ‘proper’ ([link removed])

Huffington post - Matt Hancock Holds Shares In Sister's Firm Who Won NHS Contracts ([link removed])
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** According to British Heart Foundation (BHF) analysis, Heart and circulatory deaths attributed to excess weight and obesity total around 31,000 every year in the UK.

This is equivalent to around 85 deaths each day from heart and circulatory diseases attributed to a BMI (body mass index) of 25 or more, such as a heart attack or stroke. This is like the proportion of deaths from heart and circulatory diseases attributed to smoking – underlining the huge toll that excess weight takes on the nation’s health.

The BHF says that the COVID-19 pandemic has put a spotlight on the urgent need to reduce Britain’s concerning obesity levels. Research has shown that living with obesity can increase your risk of serious COVID-19 illness, as well as your risk of heart and circulatory diseases and other long-term conditions like Type 2 diabetes and certain cancers. The proportion of people with obesity in the UK has almost doubled since the early 1990s. At present, in the UK, an estimated 28% of adults have obesity, classed as having a BMI of more than 30 (more than 15 million adults), while 64% have a BMI of over 25 (around 34 million adults).

To address this significant public health challenge affecting millions of people, BHF is calling on the Government to press ahead with introducing the package of measures set out in its obesity strategy, which it announced last year. The Government’s strategy will only be successful if it changes the unhealthy environment in which we live, the BHF says.

Dr Charmaine Griffiths, Chief Executive at the British Heart Foundation, said: “With Covid-19 and obesity, the country faces two epidemics interacting at once. We know obesity is a complex issue, and simply telling people to exercise more and eat less alone will not solve it. We need to address the key factors that make an unhealthy environment, and the Government must not waver in implementing the bold measures outlined in the obesity strategy they announced last year, such as a 9 pm watershed and clear restrictions on online junk food advertising.”

Source: About Manchester, 16 April 2021
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**
See also: BHF – Around 31,000 heart and circulatory deaths attributed to excess weight and obesity every year ([link removed])
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** International
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** New Zealand has announced a suite of proposals to move the country closer to being smokefree by 2025. Plans under consideration include outlawing the sale of tobacco to people born after a certain date, as well as a significant reduction in the level of nicotine allowed in tobacco products, prohibiting filters, setting a minimum price for tobacco, and restricting the locations where tobacco and cigarettes can be sold.

Dr Ayesha Verrall, associate Health Minister, said: “We need a new approach. About 4,500 New Zealanders die every year from tobacco, and we need to make accelerated progress to be able to reach that goal [of Smokefree 2025]. Business-as-usual without a tobacco control program won’t get us there.”

Several public health organisations welcomed the proposals. Cancer Society chief executive Lucy Elwood said, “This proposal goes beyond assisting people to quit.” She noted that the number of tobacco retailers was four times higher in low-income communities, where smoking rates were highest. She said: “These glaring inequities are why we need to protect future generations from the harms of tobacco. Tobacco is the most harmful consumer product in history and needs to be phased out.”

El-Shadan Tautolo, a public health professor at Auckland University of Technology, also called the plan “a turning point.” If it included enough resources and the right people, “we will be able to reach our communities who have been underserved and under-resourced for long enough,” he added.

Smoking accounts for one in four cancer deaths in New Zealand, and around half a million New Zealanders smoke daily. The effects of that are most-felt among Māori, New Zealand’s indigenous people: Māori women have the country’s highest smoking rates, with about 30% smoking daily.

Source: The Guardian, 16 April 2021

See also: New Zealand Ministry of Health - Proposals for a Smokefree Aoteaorao 2025 Action Plan ([link removed].)
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** Spain’s Ministry of Health is finalising a draft proposal to prohibit smoking on all terraces, even when a safe distance can be guaranteed. Since August 2020, smoking is only prohibited on terraces or in public if there is no possibility of maintaining a safe distance. However, six regions - the Balearic Islands, the Canary Islands, Cantabria, Valencia, Asturias and Aragón extended this ban.

The Ministry of Health wants to replicate the measure across the entire country, prohibiting tobacco consumption, electronic cigarettes, and water pipes on outdoor terraces regardless of the two metres’ safety distance as part of a measure to stop the spread of coronavirus.

The Ministry of Health considers that banning smoking on the terraces would meet the “double objective” of “acting on smoking as a risk factor for infection and contagion of COVID-19, together with the need to contribute to the control of the evolution of the disease itself (smoking) in Spain.”

Source: Sur, 15 April 2021
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Read Article ([link removed] )


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** Health advocates say New Jersey’s temporary coronavirus-related ban on smoking in the Atlantic City casinos should be made permanent.

Some state legislators said on Thursday (15 April) they will push to make that happen. New Jersey Assemblywoman Valerie Vainieri Huttle said: “We’ve seen it’s possible for casinos to operate with smoking bans because they had no choice.” She said the law passed in 2006 that exempted casinos prompted bills that would ban smoking in casinos in many subsequent years, but they went nowhere in the state Legislature. “This time is definitely different. For over a year, we’ve been battling with a respiratory virus, one that disproportionately impacts smokers,” Valerie added.

But the Casino Association of New Jersey, the trade group representing the Atlantic City casinos, said a permanent ban would do great harm to the industry. Atlantic City tried a partial smoking ban in October 2008 that lasted less than three weeks. Several casinos claimed they saw double-digit declines in revenue during that time. The Atlantic City Hilton and Resorts said the smoking ban led them to $1 million monthly losses at both properties.

However, Karen Blumenfeld, executive director of Global Advisors on Smokefree Policy, said the Atlantic City casinos still increased their revenues that month, despite the partial ban. “And that was when the stock market tanked from the mortgage-backed securities market crash,” she said. “You can’t choose to breathe, so the air needs to be clean and free from carcinogens known to cause cancer.”

Source: Daily Mail, 15 April 2021
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Read Article ([link removed])


** Links of the Week
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**
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** You are invited to sign up for a webinar co-hosted by the UK Public Health Network (UKPHN) and Prevention of Disease Using Trade Agreements (PETRA) on 30 April from 10:00 – 12 noon.

The webinar aims to:
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** Examine the legal and political consequences and implications for the UK of leaving the EU.
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** Examine the health implications for the UK now that it has left the EU.
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** Consider the opportunities for a health-focused trade policy in the UK as a result of leaving the EU.
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** Register here: [link removed]

You may submit your questions before the webinar by emailing: [email protected] (mailto:[email protected])
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**
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** A new BTS project which aims to support those who provide smoking cessation services in hospitals will begin later this year. BTS is seeking a part-time project manager to support this project. This new project will support sharing, supporting, disseminating and updating information throughout the life of the Long-Term Plan smoking cessation project.

The application deadline is 23rd April 2021.

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** Candidates should send a CV and covering letter to Sally Welham: [email protected] (mailto:[email protected]) .

Full details can be found here: [link removed] ([link removed]) .
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**
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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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