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** 01 March 2022
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** UK
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** Campaigners call for action over UK’s “shameful” lung health (#1)
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** International
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** Republic of Ireland: All tobacco and vaping product sales should be banned to people under 21, Oireachtas to hear (#2)
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** New study supports link between smoking, obesity, and mental ill health in adolescence and faster ageing in adulthood (#3)
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** Parliamentary Activity
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** Parliamentary questions (#4)
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** UK
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** Campaigners call for action over UK’s “shameful” lung health
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** The UK has the highest death rate for lung conditions in western Europe, research reveals, prompting calls from health leaders for urgent action to tackle the “national scandal”.
More than 100,000 people in the UK die from conditions including asthma attacks, bronchitis, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and pneumonia every year, according to data analysis by the charity Asthma and Lung UK.
Across Europe, only Turkey has a higher respiratory death rate than the UK, analysis of data up to 2018 shows, the latest comparable data available from across the continent. The death rate is 162.7 per 100,000 people in Turkey and 134.5 in the UK. In contrast, the death rate in Germany and France is half that of the UK (76.8 and 59.1 respectively).
Asthma and Lung UK described these results as “shameful” and said that lung conditions had for too long been treated like the “poor relation compared with other major illnesses like cancer and heart disease”.
Despite them being the third biggest cause of death in the UK, only 2% of publicly funded research is spent on lung conditions, it added. The charity is calling for more funding to research diagnostic tools and treatments and urged ministers to bring in tougher clean air targets. It also called for improvements in the care of patients outside hospital.
Even before the pandemic, significant numbers of lung patients were not receiving “basic care” from their GP services such as medicine checks and help using their inhalers, the charity said. Over the past two years, the health of thousands more has deteriorated while they waited for respiratory care, and diagnosis rates have fallen.
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** Source: The Guardian, 28 Feb 2022
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** See also: Asthma + Lung UK - Strategy to 2027 ([link removed])
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Read Article ([link removed])
** International
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** Republic of Ireland: All tobacco and vaping product sales should be banned to people under 21, Oireachtas to hear
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** All tobacco products including vaping products should be banned for sale to people under the age of 21, the Royal College of Physicians in Ireland (RCPI) will argue at an Oireachtas Committee today (1^st March 2022).
The All-Party Committee on Health is discussing the Public Health (Tobacco and Nicotine Inhaling Products) Bill 2019 and will hear submissions from the RCPI, industry group Vape Business Ireland, as well as Healthy Ireland.
In its opening statement, the RCPI will argue that vaping be subject to similar stringent restrictions as smoking products. It will set out a case for increasing the minimum age for the sale of tobacco products (including vaping products) from 18 to 21.
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** Source: The Irish Times, 1 March 2022
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Read Article ([link removed])
** New study supports link between smoking, obesity, and mental ill health in adolescence and faster ageing in adulthood
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** A new study conducted using data from New Zealand has found that adolescents aged 11 to 15 who were obese, smoked cigarettes daily, or had a psychological disorder such as anxiety, depression, or ADHD, biologically aged nearly three months faster every year than their peers.
The research used data from 910 people who were part of the Dunedin Study, a long-term investigation that tracked the health and behaviour of participants born between April 1972 and March 1973 in Dunedin, New Zealand, following them from age 3 until they were 45 years old.
By age 45, the study found that participants who had at least two out of three general health concerns (smoking, obesity or psychological disorders) as adolescents, walked 11.2 centimetres per second slower, had an older brain age by two and a half years, and had an older facial age by nearly four years than those who didn't.
There are several reasons why smoking, psychological disorders and obesity could accelerate aging, the authors said: All can impact factors linked with accelerated aging, such as greater inflammation and oxidative stress, an imbalance between free radicals and antioxidants in the body. Free radicals are unstable molecules from environmental sources like cigarette smoke or pesticides, which can damage the body's cells.
Lead author, Kyle Bourassa said: "There's a long history of that kind of research in terms of how smoking is damaging at the cellular level but also can result in the kinds of health conditions that we associate with biological aging, like (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease), lung cancer, things like that."
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Source: CNN, 28 Feb 2022
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** See also: JAMA Network - Association of Treatable Health Conditions During Adolescence With Accelerated Aging at Midlife ([link removed])
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Read Article ([link removed])
** Parliamentary Activity
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** Parliamentary Question 1
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** PQ1 - Oral Tobacco
Asked by Martyn Day, Linlithgow and East Falkirk
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, pursuant to the Answer of 9 February to Question 112640 on Tobacco: Mortality Rates, for what reason he has made no formal assessment of the adverse health risks of snus.
Answered by Maggie Throup, Public Health Minister
The Department has not undertaken its own formal review of snus as it is banned in the United Kingdom and we have no plans to introduce additional tobacco products to the market.
Source: Hansard, 28 Feb 2022
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View Transcript ([link removed])
** Parliamentary Question 2
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** PQ2 - Electronic Cigarettes
Asked by Daisy Cooper, St Albans
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment his Department has made of the recommendation from the UK Vaping Industry Association (UKVIA) to regulate the branding and packaging of e-cigarette products to ensure that they do not inadvertently appeal to non-smokers or young people.
Answered by Maggie Throup, Public Health Minister
We are currently assessing the regulations on the branding and packaging of e-cigarette products to ensure that they do not inadvertently appeal to non-smokers or young people. A range of regulatory proposals, including related to e-cigarettes, are being considering as part of the Independent Review on Tobacco Control and for the Tobacco Control Plan.
Source: Hansard, 28 Feb 2022
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View Transcript ([link removed])
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