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** 8 April 2022
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** UK
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** Record-breaking £28k illegal tobacco haul found in Eastbourne (#1)
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** Michael Marmot: Studying health inequalities has been my life’s work. What’s about to happen in the UK is unprecedented (#2)
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** International
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** EU rules dampen Danish government plan to ban future cigarette sales (#3)
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** Study: Smokers with heart disease could gain 5 healthy years by quitting (#4)
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** USA: Casino smoking ban rally set for Atlantic City as bill to close loophole adds more sponsors (#5)
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** Links of the Week
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** Let's Talk E-cigarettes podcast, Ep.14 (#6)
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** The Health Foundation podcast: Time to get tougher on the risk factors fraying our health? Ep.18 (#7)
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** Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) - Pouches, crushballs and beyond: an update on the ASA’s recent work on e-cigarettes and related products (#8)
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** BBC Radio 4: The Front Row – Smoking on screen (#9)
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** UK
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** Record-breaking £28k illegal tobacco haul found in Eastbourne
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** Cigarettes and rolling tobacco worth approximately £28,000 were found hidden in a flat in Eastbourne town centre, East Sussex County Council (ESCC) has confirmed.

An ESCC spokesperson said the discovery included 18,500 illegal cigarettes and more than 19kgs of illegal hand-rolling tobacco. East Sussex Trading Standards officers, Sussex Police and other agencies, made the discovery on March 31.

Darrell Gale, director of Public Health in East Sussex, said:, “Public Health will continue to support the excellent work of our local enforcement agencies. This result helps protect local children from becoming dependent on tobacco.”

“There are an estimated 57,000 smokers in East Sussex and, each year, approximately 1,000 deaths in the county are attributable to smoking. Most smokers started before they were 18 and illegal tobacco is sold at pocket money prices getting local children, in the poorest parts of the county, addicted to tobacco, perpetuating the cycle of health inequalities.”

Sussex Express, 7 April 2022
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** Michael Marmot: Studying health inequalities has been my life’s work. What’s about to happen in the UK is unprecedented
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** Michael Marmot, Director of UCL’s Institute of Health Equity and professor of epidemiology and public health, shares his thoughts on the “unprecedented” cost-of-living crisis in the UK:

Marmot highlights the stark increase in bills and energy prices which is expected throughout 2022. Marmot contrasts this with a projected 4% decrease in average household income in 2022-3, which will hit those on the lowest incomes the hardest.

Marmot also highlights three prominent factors to consider when exploring the health and wellbeing effects of these financial stressors: “differential effects of losses as against gains; relative and absolute poverty; and the value provided to people by welfare and public services.”

He explores the role of absolute and relative poverty in people’s health and happiness and argues that both are differentially but equally important for physical and mental health and, finally, demonstrates how the increased cost of living with cuts to public services create a compounded negative effect on people’s quality of life.

Marmot concludes by saying: “Unless we deal with the inability of people to meet their basic needs, by adequate income and services, we are in danger of inflicting a humanitarian calamity in one of the richest countries in the world.”

Source: The Guardian, 8 April 2022
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** International
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** EU rules dampen Danish government plan to ban future cigarette sales

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** A government proposal to curtail future cigarette sales by permanently banning anyone born after 2010 from buying them looks unlikely to be passed into law due to EU rules.

The Danish government last month unveiled plans to ensure that future generations are tobacco-free by banning the sale of cigarettes and other nicotine products to anyone born after 2010.

People under 18 are not legally allowed to purchase cigarettes under current Danish laws, so although the ban would not have an effect for six years, it would prevent people born after 2010 from ever buying cigarettes.

However, the Danish government’s plan now looks unlikely to be passed in its current form as EU member states may not forbid the sale of tobacco, according to a response given to a parliamentary question by the Danish health minister, Magnus Heunicke.

“It is based on this that the Ministry of Health concludes that a ban on sales of nicotine or tobacco products to persons born after 2010 or later would require a change to the (EU) tobacco directive,” Heunicke said. “As the rules are now, we could introduce it and roll it out until 2035. But after that the tobacco directive would have to be changed for us to continue the rules,” he said.

The minister said the government had not given up hope of implementing the rule in future despite the limitations currently presented by EU rules.

The Local Denmark, 7 April 2022
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** Study: Smokers with heart disease could gain 5 healthy years by quitting

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** Smoking cessation adds the same number of heart disease-free years to life as three preventive medications combined, according to research presented at ESC Preventive Cardiology 2022, a scientific congress of the European Society of Cardiology (ESC).

“The benefits of smoking cessation are even greater than we realized,” said study author Dr. Tinka Van Trier of Amsterdam University Medical Centre, the Netherlands. “Our study shows that kicking the habit appears to be as effective as taking three medications for preventing heart attacks and strokes in those with a prior heart attack or procedure to open blocked arteries. Patients could gain nearly five years of healthy life.”

The study used data from 989 patients aged 45 years and older who were still smoking at least six months after having a heart attack and/or undergoing stent implantation or bypass surgery. The average age was 60 years and 23% were women. Patients were generally well treated with standard preventive medications (antiplatelets, statins and blood pressure-lowering drugs). The median time since the heart attack or procedure was 1.2 years.

The researchers used the SMART-REACH model (available at u-prevent.com) to estimate the gain in healthy years if patients quit smoking. They also calculated the gain in healthy years if patients continued smoking but took three additional drugs to prevent cardiovascular disease. The three medications included bempedoic acid and PCSK9 inhibitors, which lower LDL cholesterol, and colchicine, an anti-inflammatory therapy.

The researchers found that the estimated benefit of quitting smoking appeared to be comparable to using all three pharmaceutical treatments. Smoking cessation resulted in a gain of 4.81 event-free years while the three medications together provided a gain of 4.83 event-free years.

Dr Van Trier stated that “smoking cessation remains a cornerstone of preventing heart attacks and strokes and improving overall health at any time, including after a heart attack and at any age. We know that cigarette smoking is responsible for 50% of all avoidable deaths in smokers, of which half are due to cardiovascular disease. Giving up cigarettes after a heart attack is linked with improved survival compared with persistent smoking.”

Source: MedicalXpress, 8 April 2022
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** USA: Casino smoking ban rally set for Atlantic City as bill to close loophole adds more sponsors

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** As state legislators continue to sign on to legislation to ban smoking in casinos, groups are planning a rally at McClinton Waterfront Park to encourage the Legislature to pass the bills in both houses.

“It’s time to take the next step and hold hearings on this legislation in both the Senate and Assembly Health Committees,” said Cynthia Hallett, president and CEO of the Americans for Nonsmokers’ Rights Foundation.

The rally will be held at 10 a.m. on Tuesday (April 12th), according to Americans for Nonsmokers’ Rights and Casino Employees Against Smoking’s Effects (CEASE) and will mark the 16th anniversary of a law that created a casino smoking loophole, allowing indoor smoking in casinos and simulcasting facilities while banning it in every other type of business.

Four more members of the Assembly reported on Thursday that they have become co-sponsors of the bipartisan legislation to eliminate the casino smoking loophole.

Co-sponsor and Assembly member, Rep. Benji Wimberly said in a press release, “No employer should be allowed to knowingly subject their workers to a carcinogen,”. “I’m co-sponsoring A2151 to protect casino workers from the harmful effects of what has been documented to those who breathe in secondhand smoke. The time is now to get this done.”

Source: The Press of Atlantic City, 7 April 2022
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** Links of the Week
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** Let's Talk E-cigarettes podcast, Ep.14

Assistant Professor Jamie Hartmann-Boyce and Dr Nicola Lindson talk with Dr Ailsa Butler from the Centre for Evidence Based Medicine, University of Oxford and co-author of the Cochrane review of e-cigarettes for smoking cessation. They discuss the findings of their recent work on the longer term use of e-cigarettes when provided as a tool to stop smoking.
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** See also: Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine ([link removed])
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** The Health Foundation podcast: Time to get tougher on the risk factors fraying our health? Ep.18
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** Chief Executive of the Health Foundation, Dr Jennifer Dixen is joined by Professor Kevin Fenton, regional director for London at the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities (OHID) and Richard Sloggett, founder and director of Future Health to discuss the stall in health life expectancy in the UK and the preventable risk factors impacting our health.
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** Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) - Pouches, crushballs and beyond: an update on the ASA’s recent work on e-cigarettes and related products

The ASA summarises new nicotine replacement products, trends in public complaints over their marketing and new rules for e-cigarettes marketers.

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** BBC Radio 4: The Front Row – Smoking on screen
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**
Benedict Cumberbatch admitted to giving himself nicotine poisoning for his role in BAFTA-winning film The Power of the Dog. Joining Samira to discuss the practicalities as well as the impact of smoking on screen are actor and former president of the actors’ union Equity, Malcolm Sinclair; Philippa Harte, set decorator for BBC period drama A Very British Scandal and Dr. Alex Barker, Lecturer in Psychology at the Nottingham Trent University.
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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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