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ASH Daily News

23 December 2003


HEADLINES

Vitamin may help cure lung disease
Welsh council plans blanket ban on smoking
Death of a smoker


FULL TEXT

Vitamin may help cure lung disease

Vitamin A could be used to treat the as yet incurable lung disease
emphysema. Scientists from the Medical Research Centre for
Developmental Neurobiology at King's College, London, discovered that
retinoic acid, a derivative of vitamin A, can reverse damage caused to
the lungs of mice. Organs that had developed the defects that cause
emphysema were restored to normal by retinoic acid, which is used to
treat chronic acne. Trials are now being carried out to see if the same
striking effects can be achieved in humans.

The Times, The Sun, 23/12/03



Welsh council plans blanket ban on smoking

A Welsh council could become one of the first organisations in the UK to
introduce a blanket ban on smoking for all its employees throughout
working hours. Denbeighshire County Council is considering extending
its existing policy to cover all staff, including those who work
outside.

Under proposals that will be discussed with staff and unions, workers
such as refuse collectors and street cleaners would not be allowed to
smoke and office workers would not be allowed to take smoking breaks.
The council leader, Eryl Williams said: "This matter arose out of a
health at work survey conducted by the Audit Commission. There will be
a full debate in the new Year and we will go into all the issues
thoroughly. A vote will be taken before any new policy is adopted."
Officers are proposing that the new policy should be in place by March
10, No Smoking Day.

Western Mail, 22/12/03
http://icwales.icnetwork.co.uk/0100news/0200wales/page.cfm?objectid=1374
8545&method=full&siteid=50082



Death of a smoker

The following letter from a radiographer is a poignant reminder of the
terrible suffering experienced by so many people who smoke:

Sir: Perhaps D B Hull writes tongue-in-cheek, and perhaps in purely
objective and economic terms I could even agree (letter, 8 December),
but I suspect the writer has not witnessed the death of a smoker.

From both personal and professional experience I can say that in fact
smokers rarely "die rapidly of acute conditions". For many, death comes
slowly and painfully as lung function gradually deteriorates until such
point that living simply becomes a matter of struggling to catch the
next breath. The suffering of the families is just as painful and
protracted, and is akin to watching and listening to a loved one slowly
drown and not being able to drag them from the water.

As a radiographer who has worked in a large heart and lung centre, I saw
many suffering this kind of living death, and as the daughter of someone
who died of smoking-related lung disease I have experienced the pain of
watching a lively, busy, vibrant man slowly deteriorate over the course
of three years (hardly rapid or acute) into a bed-ridden invalid on
permanent oxygen therapy often unable even to speak to us because of his
severe breathlessness.

The argument that smokers contribute enough money in taxes to "fund the
costs of any medical treatment" is irrelevant. There is no treatment
available which could reverse the physical effects which smoking caused
to my father's lungs or ameliorate the damage which resulted - except to
stop smoking.

The Independent, 23/12/03
http://argument.independent.co.uk/letters/story.jsp?story=475654






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Amanda Sandford
Research Manager
ASH
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amanda.sandford@ash.org.uk