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Six tips to stop smoking and stick to it
Stop smoking expert Louise Ross shares her top tips below.
- List your reasons. Write down why you want to quit. Whether it’s for your health, your family or any other reason, keep going back to your list to keep yourself focused and your motivation high.
- Stop-smoking aids. Visit the Better Health website for NHS support and resources, including facts and advice on how vaping can help you quit. You’ll also be able to find out about nicotine patches, chewing gums and even nasal sprays that can help you stay off the cigarettes.
- Tell loved ones. Tell your friends and family you’re quitting, so they know in advance and can support you, or even better, buddy up with a friend or family member who smokes – quitting together means you’ll be able to help each other every step of the way.
- Change your routine. Craving a cigarette usually lasts less than ten minutes so distract yourself – take a walk, listen to a podcast or do a hobby. You can get through these moments.
- Count the savings. On average smokers spend £38 a week on tobacco – that means you could have around £2,000 more to spend a year by quitting. Focus on that holiday you could go on or that special item you could buy with the money you save.
- Use Stoptober help. The Stoptober Facebook community is a great space to talk to fellow smokers going through Stoptober, where you can share your struggles and motivate each other to keep going. Remind yourself that there are thousands of other people going through it with you.
Source: The Sun, 3 October 2022
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Opinion: Rightwing thinktanks run this government. But first, they had to capture the BBC
George Monbiot, columnist and the author of Feral, Regenesis and Out of the Wreckage: a New Politics for an Age of Crisis writes in the Guardian that rightwing thinktank groups are being called upon by the BBC to comment on the performance of this government as if they are impartial observers, rather than the authors of its policies.
Monbiot highlights comments by Conservative Home founder Tim Montgomerie on the day of the mini-budget, that this was “a massive moment” for the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA), which had “incubated Truss and Kwarteng during their early years as MPs”. Critical to these groups’ infiltration to Number 10, he writes, is their platforming on flagship news programmes.
Monbiot states that for years the BBC has provided these groups with a massive platform on its news and current affairs programmes. Major BBC programmes including Today, Question Time, Newsnight and Any Questions? are populated by speakers from the Institute of Economic Affairs, the Adam Smith Institute, the Taxpayers’ Alliance, the Centre for Policy Studies and Policy Exchange. He highlights findings from the Who Funds You? investigative campaign that these groups are among the most opaque of all.
Monbiot highlights the IEA’s complaint to Ofcom about the broadcaster James O’Brien’s description of the institute as a “hard-right lobby group for vested interests of big business, fossil fuels, tobacco, junk food” on his LBC show. This complaint was rejected by Ofcom, ruling that he had not distorted the facts.
The BBC editorial guidelines state that “we should make checks to establish the credentials of our contributors and to avoid being hoaxed”. Monbiot states that in previous responses to complaints however, it claimed that when giving the head of the IEA a platform to argue against new tobacco regulation, it wasn’t necessary to state that his organisation has been funded by tobacco companies, on the grounds that the IEA had not declared this interest. Monbiot concludes: “I no longer believe the BBC’s failure to uphold its own rules is an accident. I believe it’s a policy.”
Source: Guardian, 5 October 2022
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Opinion: Liz Truss's Government 'must keep commitment to Level Up health in areas like the North East'
As Liz Truss used the Conservative Party Conference to reaffirm her plan to make "difficult choices" in pursuit of economic growth, Newcastle University Medical Sciences Professor Clare Bambra, has warned the Government must not ditch its commitments to levelling up health in areas like the North East and said that implementing "trickle-down" policies is likely to exacerbate the cost-of-living crisis and create new health crises.
Her comments come as the Guardian reports the promised key policy White Paper on tackling health disparities, commissioned by the Boris Johnson-led Government, has been shelved. The Department of Health and Social Care has denied this, saying "no decisions have been taken".
Prof Bambra joined organisations including the Royal College of Physicians calling for the publishing of the paper.
Along with other public health experts, Prof Bambra has devised a five-point plan for the Government to tackle health disparities and realise the Levelling Up agenda. Published in Public Health in Practice, these are: making healthy choices easier for the public, working on long-term solutions across sectors, focusing interventions locally, targeting disadvantaged communities and allocating resources to the most deprived areas.
Speaking about how the Government and health authorities needed to consider the wider reasons behind ill-health, Prof Bambra said it was vital that the health consequences of wider Government policy were considered. She said: "It seems like we have moved from a focus on levelling up to one on trickle-down policies, which is really worrying. The cost-of-living crisis is going to be a public health crisis and that's particularly alarming [risking] creating new health problems and exacerbating those already there".
She continued: "There is no silver bullet that will solve this problem [of health inequalities]. If we are serious about tackling this problem, then we’ll need a holistic approach, with long-term, collaborative and cross-government strategies that look beyond just one election cycle."
Source: Chronicle Live, 5 October 2022
See also: Guardian - Thérèse Coffey scraps promised paper on health inequality
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US study: Exposure to advertising tied to teen e-cigarette use
Both e-cigarette advertising and peer influence are significantly associated with e-cigarette initiation among US teens, according to a study published in JAMA Network Open. The analysis included data from around 30,000 adolescents as part of the Population Assessment of Tobacco and Health study.
Researchers found that among adolescents who had never used e-cigarettes, e-cigarette advertising exposure was associated with a greater likelihood of feeling curious about using e-cigarettes and greater likelihood of becoming an ever e-cigarette user and current e-cigarette user at follow-up.
Similarly, adolescents who reported having best friends using e-cigarettes were more likely to feel curious about using e-cigarettes and initiate e-cigarette use at follow-up versus adolescents who reported having no best friends using e-cigarettes.
The researchers called for greater efforts to address e-cigarette advertising exposure and peer influence for teens.
Source: Medical Xpress, 5 October 2022
See also: Study - Association of e-cigarette advertising, parental influence, and peer influence with US adolescent e-cigarette use
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US study: Many New Jersey merchants will sell tobacco products to underage buyers
Although New Jersey and federal law both prohibit merchants from selling tobacco to customers under the age of 21, high rates of non-compliance have been observed. Underage buyers aged 18 to 20 successfully purchased cigarettes, cigars and other tobacco products in more than 40% of store visits.
In a study to be published in JAMA Network Open, researchers said that while buyers in this age range were carded in 65.9% of purchase attempts, they were still successful at purchasing 14% of the time, and stores sold them the requested products even when buyers used a valid driver’s licences that clearly showed them to be under 21.
Study buyers were instructed to ask for tobacco products but never to lie about their age and always to present their real driver’s licences to stores that asked for identification. Licences issued to NJ residents under 21 are vertically oriented, so cashiers who asked for identification could immediately see, without having to calculate, that would-be purchasers were underage.
Independent convenience stores and gas kiosks carded less frequently than chain convenience stores. The strongest predictor of an underage sale was failing to card.
Lead author Mary Hrywna, an assistant professor at the Rutgers Centre for Tobacco Studies and Rutgers School of Public Health, said: “A better understanding of how the problem varies from place to place will increase our chances of solving it or, at the very least, minimising it [...] Efforts to delay tobacco usage are important because the younger people are when they begin experimenting with tobacco products, the greater their chance of becoming addicted and suffering serious health problems down the road.”
Source: ScienMag, 5 October 2022
See also: Study - Retailer Compliance With Tobacco 21 in New Jersey, 2019-2020
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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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