ASH Daily News for 29 July 2008

Secondhand smoke seen to raise spouse's stroke risk

Nonsmokers married to smokers have a greatly increased chance of having strokes, according to a U.S. study published on Tuesday showing yet another hazard from secondhand smoke. Being married to a smoker raised the stroke risk by 42 percent in people who have never smoked compared to those married to someone who never smoked, the researchers said. This jumped to 72 percent for former smokers married to a current smoker, according to the study published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.

Former smokers who were married to smokers had a stroke risk similar to people who themselves were smokers. "Quitting smoking helps your own health and also the health of the people living with you," Maria Glymour of Harvard School of Public Health in Boston and Columbia University in New York, who led the study, said in a telephone interview. The study involved 16,225 people aged 50 and up who had never had a stroke. They were followed for an average of nine years.

Glymour said there is accumulating evidence about the number of health problems linked to secondhand smoke. Previous research had suggested that secondhand smoke increases the risk of stroke, but Glymour said stroke risk has been studied more extensively in smokers than in people exposed to secondhand smoke. People who breathe in secondhand smoke also have a higher risk of lung cancer, nasal sinus cancer, respiratory tract infections and heart disease, among other conditions.

A 2006 U.S. surgeon general's report said secondhand smoke contains hundreds of chemicals known to be toxic or cancer-causing. These include formaldehyde, benzene, vinyl chloride, arsenic, ammonia and hydrogen cyanide. For this study, smoking involved cigarettes and not pipes or cigars. It looked at health consequences for the spouses of smokers, but not at the long-term stroke risk in children of smokers due to secondhand smoke. "We know that there are a lot of undesirable health consequences for kids, especially asthma and breathing problems that are exacerbated by secondhand smoke," Glymour said.

Source: The Mirror, 29 July 2008
Link: http://tiny.cc/h9kRa

Pub faces fine over smokers

A landlady has become the first to be prosecuted by Bradford Council for allowing punters to flout the smoking ban in a pub. Kathleen Hall is facing a fine of up to £2,500 plus costs after admitting failing to stop people from smoking in the Welcome Inn, Grant Street, Keighley, on February 2. Speaking after the court hearing, Mrs Hall said that steps leading up to the pub were difficult for her older customers to climb every time they wanted to go outside for a cigarette.

She said: "Older people like to come to the pub and it's a safe haven for them. The young people who come in respect the older customers. Ninety per cent of customers are older end. There are customers coming in here who fought in the Second World War. When they were coming home from wars the Government used to give them cigarettes. They introduced the tobacco and now they have taken that away from them. A bloke comes in here who is just short of 80 and they have taken that away from him. I haven't seen him for weeks. He does not want to tackle the steps and can stay at home and have a cigarette with a drink. There are 15 steps up to the pub and it's difficult for the older people to get up and down." Mrs Hall, who says takings have fallen by about 40 per cent since the ban was introduced, added: "I don't believe in the smoking ban."

The 54-year-old landlady, who spends £35 a week on smoking, was not in court for the hearing before Bradford magistrates yesterday but in a statement read to the court, she said that she had stopped the smoking. "Anyone who now thinks of lighting a cigarette will be told to leave along with barring them from the public house," the court heard. Sentence was adjourned until October after magistrates asked to see trading income details and full details of her and her husband's income.

Source: Yorkshire Post, 25 July 2008
Link: http://tiny.cc/oMILs  

Pub landlady breaks smoking ban

An undercover investigation by council workers in Devon, which found a pub landlady to be breaking the smoking ban led to her prosecution, according to the BBC. Joanne Kendall who runs the Stag's Head in Barnstaple allowed customers to smoke in her pub and was found to be lighting up behind the bar herself. She was fined £130 plus legal costs.

Nick Perkins, licensing officer for North Devon District Council, said: "There were further complaints from other landlords saying it was an unfair advantage, and their customers were going to the Stag's Head." Around 4,500 pubs in North Devon have been prosecuted since the ban came into affect last July.

Source: Eat Out Magazine, 28 July 2008
Link: http://tiny.cc/BNIXm  

Tobacco Ban remains elusive at U.N. Headquarters

When a state-wide ban on smoking came into effect in New York in July 2003, perhaps the only institution outside that stringent law was the United Nations, primarily because its headquarters premises is deemed international territory. At the U.N. Secretariat, smoking is "discouraged" but not banned -- although virtually all agencies in New York, including the U.N. children's agency UNICEF and the U.N. Population Fund (UNFPA), have barred smoking in their premises.

Last week, the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), comprising 54 member states, adopted a resolution recommending that the 192-member General Assembly, the highest policy-making body, "consider" taking steps towards a smoke-free United Nations. Douglas Bettcher, director of the Tobacco Free Initiative at the World Health Organization (WHO), said an Ad Hoc Inter-agency Task Force on tobacco control, consisting of several U.N. agencies, has recommended that the United Nations as a whole take a strong stance on the issue.

Since the General Assembly had not taken any action on a previous ECOSOC resolution, he said the Council's 54 members should re-state their recommendations at the next session of the Assembly, beginning September, for "a complete ban on smoking and on sales of tobacco in its premises." Some of the countries speaking in support of the resolution included Uruguay ("the first Latin American country to become totally tobacco-free"), Argentina, Switzerland, Norway, Australia, New Zealand and Canada.

A 19-page report of the ad hoc committee warns that of the more than 1.3 billion smokers alive today, about 650 million, at least half, will eventually be killed by tobacco. The study also faults the U.N.'s Global Compact, described as the world's largest voluntary corporate citizenship initiative, for harboring tobacco companies under its umbrella. "WHO believes that the tobacco industry and corporate social responsibility are an inherent contradiction," it says. "It is unfortunate that some tobacco companies have been able to join the Global Compact given that it is an important corporate citizenship initiative," the study points out.

The report also says that WHO can continue to monitor the activities of the tobacco industry and forward information to the Global Compact when a company infringes national laws relating to tobacco control. This can eventually be used by the Global Compact when the status of a company is reviewed and can be included in the portfolio of the company when its Global Compact participant status is reviewed, it added. At present, there are about five companies, directly or indirectly related to the tobacco industry, which are participants in the Global Compact.

The Global Compact's 10 universal principles are derived from international instruments and address several issues, including human rights, labor standards, the environment and anti-corruption measures. Kathy Mulvey, international policy director at Corporate Accountability International, told IPS that banning smoking on U.N. premises is a welcome step. "However, all arms of the United Nations can do more to advance tobacco control via the global tobacco treaty," she said.

Source: Asian Tribune, 29 July 2008
Link: http://tiny.cc/VmhFe