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ASH Daily news for 12 July 2011

HEADLINES

  • Smoking during pregnancy 'raises birth defect risk'

    Women who smoke while pregnant should be aware that they are increasing the chance their baby will be born malformed, say experts.

    The risk for having a baby with missing or deformed limbs or a cleft lip is over 25% higher for smokers, data show.

    Along with higher risks of miscarriage and low birth weight, it is another good reason to encourage women to quit, say University College London doctors.

    In England and Wales 17% of women smoke during pregnancy. And among under 20s the figure is 45%.

    Although most will go on to have a healthy baby, smoking can cause considerable damage to the unborn child.

    The experts base their calculations on 172 research papers published over the last 50 years, which looked at maternal smoking and birth defects.

    The findings, from 174,000 cases of malformation and 11.7 million healthy births, revealed that smoking increased the risk of many abnormalities.

    Amanda Sandford of Action on Smoking and Health said: "This study shows some of the worst outcomes of smoking during pregnancy. Pregnant smokers will be shocked to learn that their nicotine habit could cause eye or limb deformities in their baby.

    "There is clearly a need to raise awareness of these risks among girls and to ensure pregnant women are given all the support they need to help them quit smoking and to stay stopped after the birth."

    See also:
    - Birth defects linked for first time to smoking in pregnancy, The Guardian

    Source: BBC News - 12 July 2011
    Link: http://bbc.in/ooR2BK

  • "Health Hitlers" and a mutiny in the town trying to ban smoking

    Should the day come, in some future age, when Britain bans smoking altogether, then the pretty little town of Stony Stratford will become a hallowed historic landmark.

    On July 19, town councillors will vote on whether to make this settlement, on the edge of Milton Keynes, the first place in Britain to ban smoking in all public areas.

    If they vote for a ban, then from the medieval High Street to the 18th-century Market Square, anyone caught smoking in public, inside or out, could be hit with a £70 to £100 fine.

    Four petitions against the ban — with hundreds of names on them — have been doing the rounds of the town’s pubs, and opponents are planning to pack the council chamber on the day of the vote.

    The smokers and non-smokers alike of Stony Stratford think a public smoking ban is a step too far.
    ‘They’re little Hitlers, wanting to stop people smoking,’ says Garry Stubbs, 50, a local software business owner. ‘I don’t smoke, but I still object to the ban.

    ‘What will they ban next? Open-toed sandals?’ he says, pointing to his sandal-clad feet. ‘You’ve got to let people make their own choice. This is petty bureaucracy, the nanny state interfering with our civil liberties.’

    But Councillor Bartlett is unmoved by such talk.‘I fall about laughing when people start talking about civil liberties,’ he says, ‘I’ve never ever suggested there should be an outright ban on smoking altogether.

    ‘Just because a minority of people do something, it doesn’t mean it should be protected. A minority of people do graffiti — is that OK? You don’t support murderers and gangsters just because they’re a minority.

    ‘I’ve had people swearing at me on the street. I’ve even had people comparing me with the Nazis.
    ‘But I’ve had a lot of support, too. People have said they hope I change the world by doing this, and I take great pride in them saying that. If I do change the world, that’s great.’
     

    Source: Daily Mail - 12 July 2011
    Link: http://bit.ly/o5rP7d

  • Leicester city centre pubs are urged to clear up fag ends

    Licensees need to share responsibility for clearing up cigarette ends dropped by their customers, according to the city council.

    The authority is putting pressure on pubs and bars to clear up the butts to save its own staff time and money.

    The crackdown comes as a survey by Keep Britain Tidy revealed cigarette litter is now at its highest level since it first recorded the problem in 2002/03 and has risen sharply since the smoking ban was introduced in 2007.

    The group says butts are found on 81 per cent of our streets – rising to 99 per cent in town and city centres.

    As part of its crackdown, the council is also urging smokers themselves to be considerate.

    Of 1,047 fixed penalty notices for littering handed out by city wardens last year , 895 were for dropping cigarette ends.

    In Keep Britain Tidy's survey, more than a quarter of smokers questioned said they did not class dropping their butts as littering.

    Source: This is Leicestershire - 11 July 2011
    Link: http://bit.ly/nygay3

  • Secondhand smoke 'could increase risk of ADHD in children by 50%'

    Children exposed to secondhand smoke in the home increase their odds of developing common mental and behavioral disorders by 50 per cent, experts say.

    Passive smoking is already known to increase the risk of cot death, asthma, meningitis and middle-ear infections among children.

    In the latest study, scientists analysed more than 50,000 results from a U.S children's health survey conducted between 2007 and 2008.

    Lead researchers from the Harvard School of Public Health found that six per cent of children under-12 were exposed to passive smoking at home - which is equivalent to around five million children.

    These youngsters were 50 per cent more likely to develop 'neurobehavioural disorders' such as a learning disability (8.2 per cent), ADHD (5.9 per cent) or another conduct disorders (3.6 per cent).

    They were also 50 per cent more likely to suffer from two or more disorders as well as having undergone counselling.

    Boys and children aged between nine and 11-years-old were found to be at the greatest risk, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study.

    The results were weighted to adjust for other known risk factors such as the family's economic status and the mother's level of education.

    Although the team have found a strong association between secondhand smoke and neurobehavioural disorders they haven't proved that one has caused the other.

    Source: Daily Mail - 11 July 2011
    Link: http://bit.ly/p5aItW

  • Bollywood films promote smoking among children: Study

    Adolescents who watch Bollywood stars light up or use other tobacco products on screen are more likely to be tobacco users, says a new study.

    "The odds of using tobacco once or more in a lifetime among students who were highly exposed to tobacco use occurrences in Bollywood films were more than twice as compared to those with low exposure," says the study published online in the British Medical Journal.

    A sample of 3956 students aged between 12-16 years were surveyed from 12 schools selected randomly across New Delhi in the year 2009 for the study titled "Tobacco use in Bollywood movies, tobacco promotional activities and their association with tobacco use among Indian adolescents."  

    Source: The Economic Times - 12 July 2011
    Link: http://bit.ly/neQd0r

  • Chicago: Grants awarded to encourage smoke-free apartments

    An anti-tobacco advocacy group is working to increase the number of smoke-free apartment buildings in Chicago.

    The Chicago Tobacco Prevention Project is awarding thousands of dollars in grants to several housing groups to achieve that goal.

    Joel Africk, president of the Respiratory Health Association of Metropolitan Chicago, says most of the air in multi-unit residences comes from common areas and other units. So if your neighbour smokes, you end up breathing in their smoke. Secondhand smoke can increase risks for a variety of illnesses including heart and lung disease.

    Source: Times Union - 12 July 2011
    Link: http://bit.ly/nrjUp9