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** 22 April 2021
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** UK
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** PM to create No 10 unit to push through policy agenda (#1)
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** Scientific paper claiming smokers less likely to acquire Covid retracted over tobacco industry links (#2)
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** Radio London: Smokefree pavement licences (#3)
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** International
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** US: Advocacy groups try to enlist the UN to ban menthol cigarettes (#4)
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** Parliamentary Activity
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** Parliamentary questions (#5)
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** UK
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** The prime minister is reviving a Tony Blair-era initiative in announcing the creation of a delivery unit to take charge of pushing through his policy agenda after more than a year dominated by dealing with COVID-19.
The unit will be run by Dr Emily Lawson, who led the operational delivery of the NHS coronavirus vaccination programme. Lawson will take the post on secondment from the NHS in the summer, by which time most adults in the UK are expected to have had a jab. She will lead a small team made up of existing civil servants and people with key skills such as auditors and data scientists.
The Prime Minister’s official spokesman said the move followed a review by Sir Michael Barber, who set up the original Downing Street delivery unit under Mr Blair. He said the organisation will have greater authority than the existing Downing Street Implementation Unit.
The spokesman continued by saying: “It is about making sure that the Prime Minister’s priorities are being delivered. It will ensure that we have the strongest possible approach to the successful delivery of the Government’s agenda. [Johnson] thinks it’s a good way to have a small, focused team working on these priorities. Individual departments will work up policy in the usual way, but this will be about achieving delivery on time.”
The move follows reports that the Prime Minister was frustrated at the inability of the Government machine to respond effectively in the early days of the pandemic. His spokesman denied that it reflected his dissatisfaction with the performance of the Civil Service.
Source: The Guardian, 21 April 2021
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** A scientific paper claiming current smokers are 23% less likely to be diagnosed with COVID-19 than non-smokers has been retracted by a medical journal after it was discovered some of the paper’s authors had financial links to the tobacco industry.
The paper, published in July last year by the European Respiratory Journal, found “current smoking was not associated with adverse outcome” in patients admitted to hospital with Covid and claimed smokers were at a significantly lower risk of acquiring the virus. Several mainstream media outlets reported on the paper.
The latest edition of the European Respiratory Journal included a retraction notice for the paper, stating: “It was brought to the editors’ attention that two of the authors had failed to disclose potential conflicts of interest at the time of the manuscript’s submission. That is, one of the authors (José M. Mier) at the time had a current and ongoing role in providing consultancy to the tobacco industry on tobacco harm reduction; and another (Konstantinos Poulas) at the time was a principal investigator for the Greek NGO NOSMOKE … a science and innovation hub that has received funding from the Foundation for a Smoke Free World (an organisation funded by the tobacco industry).”
The director of Quit Victoria, Dr Sarah White, said retracting the paper was the right move. “We really rely on research in being able to take a dispassionate look at the data but also the interpretation of that data,” she said. “The reader needs to know that the authors have some potential or actual conflict of interest, or they’ve actually been involved with the industry.” She added there was no strong evidence to support the claim that smokers were less likely to acquire Covid or suffer severe effects from it.
Source: The Guardian, 22 April 2021
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On Tuesday, 20th April, Deborah Arnott, chief executive of ASH, appeared on Radio London to discuss why pavement licences should be designated 100% smokefree. She explained how this will help smokers quit, provide family-friendly spaces, and prevent harm caused by secondhand smoke.
Listen from 1:43:58 to 1:52:45.
Source: BBC Sounds
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Listen Here ([link removed] )
** International
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** Almost 100 advocacy groups are calling on the United Nations (UN) to pressure the US government to ban menthol tobacco products, citing evidence that manufacturers market directly to African Americans.
The request is addressed to a UN committee that seeks to end racial discrimination. The groups want the committee to call on the US to ban menthol cigarettes. They said in a letter that: “The decades of well-documented racialized and predatory tobacco industry targeting of African Americans, specifically with menthol flavouring, is a human rights issue.”
Controversy over the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) failure to enact restrictions on tobacco - despite talking about them for many years - has increased amid heightened concerns around smoking during the COVID-19 respiratory pandemic, particularly for African Americans. There has been a controversy for decades over the way menthols have been marketed to African Americans.
The FDA is expected to come out with a stance on menthol cigarettes by 29 April under a lawsuit filed by the African American Tobacco Control Leadership Council (AATCLC). The group sued the FDA for failing to regulate menthol despite congressional urging to do so in 2009.
Source: The Bloomberg, 21 April 2021
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** Parliamentary Activity
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** PQ 1-2: Electronic cigarettes (Grouped questions)
Asked by Mary Glindon, North Tyneside
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to challenge misinformation preventing long-term smokers from making the switch to less harmful alternatives as part of Vaping Awareness Month in April 2021.
Asked by Mary Glindon, North Tyneside
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment his Department has made of the effectiveness of e-cigarettes in helping adult smokers switch to less harmful alternatives; and if his Department will promote campaigns to encourage long-term smokers to switch to vaping.
Answered by Jo Churchill, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health and Social Care
The Department encourages all smokers to quit or move to less harmful products, such as e-cigarettes, if they are unable to quit. In England, an estimated 2.5 million people use e-cigarettes, the majority of whom no longer smoke. In addition, around 50,000 people a year quit smoking through switching to e-cigarettes, who would not have quit through other means.
The Better Health mass media smoking cessation campaign, delivered by Public Health England and as part of a package of tobacco control measures, has been effective at helping challenge misinformation surrounding e-cigarettes. Alongside this, local stop smoking services advise smokers of the benefits of switching to less harmful products, with some offering free vaping starter kits.
Source: Hansard, 19 April 2021
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