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** 03 March 2022
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** UK
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** Study: Introduce price cap on cigarettes to reduce smoking (#1)
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** Inequality and austerity undermine UK life expectancy targets (#2)
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** International
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** USA: Smoking restrictions at Florida's beaches, parks get green light (#3)
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** USA: E-Cigarette use linked with high-blood sugar (#4) #3
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** UK
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** Study: Introduce price cap on cigarettes to reduce smoking
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** A maximum price cap for cigarettes sold in the UK would help cut smoking rates, according to a study. A price cap set by a tobacco regulator would allow for only a minimal profit for firms, researchers from the University of Bath said.
Currently, tobacco companies have generally been able to cushion smokers from the full impact of regular tax increases on cigarettes by keeping prices on some products low and offsetting costs with increases on their other, higher-end products, the study found. A price cap, by comparison, would effectively mean there was a standardised cost for cigarettes, helping to make future tax rises “much more effective”. Like regulation for utilities industries, a wholesale price cap on cigarettes would be imposed by government or a regulatory agency. Excise duty, sales taxes, retailer mark-ups and any other legitimate costs would be added to that price to produce a shop price.
Dr Rob Branston from the University of Bath’s School of Management and Tobacco Control Research Group, and the author of the study, said: “We know that using tax to increase the price of cigarettes is one of the most cost-effective ways to reduce smoking.” “However, in many countries including the UK we also know that tax increases can often be undermined by pricing strategies by tobacco companies.”
Source: The Independent, 3 March 2022
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** Inequality and austerity undermine UK life expectancy targets
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** The UK government’s ambition to add five years to healthy life expectancy as part of its agenda to “level up” poorer regions will take close to two centuries to achieve, according to research by the Health Foundation.
The finding shines a spotlight on the sharp decline in increases to life expectancy in the UK in the past decade. It also highlights the need to better understand why these improvements tailed off after 2010, leaving the UK out of step with many comparable nations that have managed to maintain longevity gains.
When the UK government published its “levelling up” white paper in February, it set a goal of adding five years to healthy life expectancy by 2035. The health and longevity trends for men between 2009-11 and 2015-17 had implied this would be achieved in 75 years, the Health Foundation said, but the inclusion of data from 2017-19 had drastically worsened outlook, suggesting it would now take 192 years.
The calculations do not include data from the past two years, in which the pandemic has delivered another big shock to public health.
Jo Bibby, director of health at the Health Foundation, said many of the improvements in life expectancy over the past 30 years had resulted from medical advances in the management of conditions such as heart disease, and a reduction in death and illness from smoking. Not only have the benefit of these historical trends begun to fade but “we started to see the impact of newer kinds of threats to health, like obesity”, Bibby said.
Source: Financial Times, 3 March 2022
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** International
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** USA: Smoking restrictions at Florida's beaches & parks get green light
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** The Florida Senate voted 30-7 to approve a proposal (HB 105) which will enable local governments in Florida to restrict smoking at beaches and parks, on Wednesday 2 March 2022. This follows the House approving the measure in a 105-10 vote last week. The proposal would build on a 2002 constitutional amendment that prohibited smoking in restaurants and at other indoor workplaces.
Senate sponsor Joe Gruters stated the main intention of the bill is to eliminate litter from cigarette butts that do not quickly biodegrade.
"If you live near a beach, the number one picked-up item consistently on an annual basis over and over again, are cigarette butts," Gruters said. "What happens all the time is this second-hand smoke, to me, it is disgusting. But what's even more disgusting is when you reach into the sand and pick up one of those butts. And those filters that are in the cigarettes are what ends up in the water, destroying the environment."
Source: Fox 35 Orlando, 2 March 2022
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** USA: E-Cigarette use linked with high-blood sugar
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** Research from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health has linked e-cigarette use with a 22% increased likelihood of the user experiencing high blood sugar, compared to non-users. However, this is almost half the increased risk posed by traditional tobacco cigarettes, at 40%.
The study, published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, examined the links between e-cigarette use and prediabetes – a serious health condition in which blood sugar levels are higher than normal but not high enough to be diagnosed as type 2 diabetes.
The possible link between smoking or vaping and prediabetes is not understood, but nicotine which is in normal cigarettes and e-cigarettes – is known to raise blood sugar.
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** Source: Daily Mail, 3 March 2022
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** See also: American Journal of Preventive Medicine: The Association Between E-Cigarette Use and Prediabetes: Results From the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, 2016–2018 ([link removed](22)00024-1/fulltext)
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