Smokers given early ageing shock

People who smoke are being encouraged to stop by being shown what they may look like in 20 years time if they do not kick the habit.

The shock treatment is being delivered through "ageing machines" which have been placed in branches of Boots the Chemist in Glasgow and Braehead.

NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde hopes the approach will show smokers their addiction can cause premature ageing.

Those who want to stop will be able to access help at the pharmacy counter.

The software used to create the aged image is based on technology at Glasgow Science Centre.

Its potential to be modified to help smokers quit was spotted by Liz Grant, NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde's public health pharmacist.

She said: "This is a novel approach to encouraging people to quit, because for the first time they can actually look into the future and see the physical impact of smoking on their looks if they don't stop smoking, and I think many will find this shocking.

"The overall message is that smoking can age you prematurely."

The software asks for information covering current age, ethnicity and gender, followed by the age that you would like to see yourself in the future.

A picture is taken and behind the scenes it morphs the image over the period of time chosen and they appear side by side on the screen.

For Carol Jane Cameron, 41, from East Kilbride, South Lanarkshire, her picture of the future was motivation enough for her to make a second attempt to quit.

"I've been smoking since I was 16, latterly up to 20 cigarettes a day," she said.

"I'd tried before the give up, using laser treatment and herbal drops, but seeing the picture showing what you are going to look like if you keep on smoking was a shock.

"The pharmacy staff are really helpful, they don't judge you and if I need any help and support I know I can just drop in and speak to them."

Source: BBC News, 21 January 2010
Link: http://bit.ly/6xHYWC

Japan court rejects tobacco lawsuit, notes dangers

A five-year legal battle against Japan Tobacco by two former smokers and a widow has ended with damage demands thrown out, but a Japanese court for the first time clearly acknowledged the health risks of cigarettes.

“We were able to win a progressive ruling,” one of the plaintiffs, Masanobu Mizuno, 68, said on Friday. “I am deeply convinced the fight was worth it.”

The Yokohama District Court, in a ruling released on Wednesday, said there was a link between smoking and lung cancer and other respiratory illnesses, and that smoking may be addictive.

But it rejected the plaintiffs’ demand, filed in January 2005, for 30 million yen ($330,000) in damages, saying they smoked of their own will and there was no proof smoking had directly caused their sickness.

In a small victory in one of the world’s most smoker-friendly nations, the ruling’s wording on the health risks of tobacco was stronger than rulings for a similar Tokyo court case, filed in 1997. The plaintiffs lost that case too. The court said smoking was merely one possible cause of cancer and characterized quitting as easy.

Mizuno, who is so sick he comes to the courthouse in a wheelchair, smoked from age 15 to 51, and was hospitalized 11 times with emphysema during the trial. The other plaintiffs are the widow of Kenichi Morishita, who died of pneumonia and infection at 75, during the trial, and Koreyoshi Takahashi, 67, who lost a lung to cancer.

Awareness about the dangers of smoking and secondhand smoke is low in Japan, compared to the West. It is only in recent years that smoke-free restaurants, train stations and public streets have gradually becoming more widespread.

Although smoking rates have come down drastically since the 1960s when more than 80 percent of Japanese males smoked, about 40 percent still light up.

The lawsuit had demanded sterner warning labels on cigarettes, a ban on cigarette vending machines, and an acknowledgment that smoking is addictive and harmful.

Japan Tobacco Inc., a former monopoly that is still majority-owned by the government, argued that smokers are free to quit and cancer has multiple causes.

The ruling urged continued public discussion to shape policies on smoking and tobacco-selling.

Mizuno and Takahashi say they never expected to win in court, but want to send a message about their hopes for a society free of smoking-related illnesses. They collected 5,154 signatures for a petition supporting their cause over the years.

Mizuno said he hoped to decide next week whether to appeal.

“I can barely breathe now, and so I have to take it easy,” he told The Associated Press.
 

Source: The Hindu, 22 Janaury 2009 
Link: http://beta.thehindu.com/news/international/article91377.ece

Study indicates link between second-hand smoke, narrowed neck artery, and dementia

Non-smokers with both long-term exposure to second-hand cigarette smoke and narrowing of the artery that brings blood to the brain had three times the risk of developing dementia than people without either of those risk factors, according to a study led by a researcher at the San Francisco VA Medical Center.

“Other health risks from second-hand smoke have been demonstrated very well, but this is the first indication that there might be an indirect link between second-hand smoke and dementia among people with cardiovascular risk factors,” says lead author Deborah Barnes, PhD, MPH, a mental health researcher at SFVAMC and an assistant professor of psychiatry at the University of California, San Francisco.

The study, which appears in the online Advance Access section of the American Journal of Epidemiology, analyzed data from 970 participants in the Cardiovascular Health Cognition Study, a longitudinal study of risk factors for cardiovascular disease and dementia among adults 65 years or older that is funded by the National Institutes of Health. The authors looked at study participants who were lifelong non-smokers and did not have cognitive impairments when the study began, and followed them for five to six years.

According to Barnes, the researchers found no direct connection between dementia and length of exposure to second-hand smoke: “People with high levels of exposure, which we defined as more than 25 years of living with a smoker, had the same amount of risk as people with low levels.” But subjects with high levels of exposure combined with stenosis, or narrowing, of the carotid artery – the vessel in the neck that carries blood from the heart to the brain – had three times the risk of developing dementia.

“It was the combination of the two that seemed to matter,” says Barnes. She notes that carotid artery stenosis, which is caused by a buildup of plaque on the inside of the artery, often has no symptoms, so someone might have an increased risk of dementia and not even know it. It’s yet another argument for trying to keep cardiovascular disease risk factors under control.

Barnes cautions that the study is the first to indicate a link between second-hand smoke, carotid artery stenosis, and dementia, “so it is important to confirm these findings in another study population. We don’t want to leap too far in assuming a cause-and-effect relationship.”

She says that if the results are confirmed, “then they will provide additional support for all of the efforts we have made to limit people’s exposure to second-hand smoke.”

Source: Health Canal, 21 January 2010
Link: http://bit.ly/7wp00f

Lung Cancer Patients who quit smoking double their survival chances

People diagnosed with early stage lung cancer can double their chances of survival over five years if they stop smoking compared with those who continue to smoke, finds a study published online in the British Medical Journal.

This is the first review of studies to measure the effects of continued smoking after diagnosis of lung cancer and suggests that it may be worthwhile to offer smoking cessation treatment to patients with early stage lung cancer.

Worldwide, lung cancer is the most commonly diagnosed form of cancer. In the UK, it is second only to breast cancer, accounting for around 39,000 new cancer diagnoses annually.

Smoking increases the risk of developing a primary lung cancer; lifelong smokers have a 20-fold increased risk compared with non-smokers. But it is not known whether quitting after a diagnosis of lung cancer has any benefit.

So researchers at the University of Birmingham analysed the results of 10 studies that measured the effect of quitting smoking after diagnosis of lung cancer on prognosis.

Differences in study design and quality were taken into account to minimise bias.

They found that people who continued to smoke after a diagnosis of early stage lung cancer had a substantially higher risk of death and a greater risk of the tumour returning compared with those who stopped smoking at that time. Data suggested that most of the increased risk of death was due to cancer progression.

Further analysis found a five year survival rate of 63-70% among quitters compared with 29-33% among those who continued to smoke. In other words, about twice as many quitters would survive for five years compared with continuing smokers.

These findings support the theory that continued smoking affects the behaviour of a lung tumour, say the authors. They also provide a strong case for offering smoking cessation treatment to patients with early stage lung cancer.

Further trials are needed to examine these questions, they conclude.

An accompanying editorial says this study adds more to the evidence that it is never too late for people to stop, even when they have lung cancer.

Source: Science Daily, 22 January 2010 
Link: http://bit.ly/55Tatu

USA: New ACS report outlines 21 challenges and needs for global tobacco control

A new American Cancer Society report outlines 21 challenges and needs for global tobacco control, covering the wide range of issues to be addressed and expertise needed to reduce the rising tide of tobacco use worldwide, particularly in the low- and middle-income nations that are the target of the multinational tobacco industry. The report is published early online and will appear in the January/February issue of CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians.

The report's authors, led by Thomas Glynn, PhD, American Cancer Society director of Cancer Science and Trends, point out that the globalization of tobacco began with the European exploration of the New World more than 500 years ago. But it is only in the past 50 years that public health has responded to the death, disease, and economic disruption caused by tobacco use. Tobacco now has at least 1.3 billion users and kills more than 14,500 people every day, while debilitating and sickening many times that number. The report lists activities, policies, and interventions that must be increased or in some cases decreased in order to be successful in reducing the rising tide of tobacco use.

INCREASE CHALLENGES

Increase support for and adherence to the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC): The report calls this the single most important action in the effort to eliminate tobacco-related death and disease, saying all governments should be encouraged to join the more than 165 nations who already have ratified the treaty, and that those who have joined the Framework should faithfully implement it.

Increase tobacco taxes: Raising tobacco taxes is considered perhaps the most effective intervention to reduce tobacco use.

Increase access to comprehensive treatment for tobacco dependence: With more than 1.3 billion tobacco users in the world today, if only half of them wished to stop their tobacco use, there would be need for access to tobacco dependence treatment for greater than 650 million tobacco users. Furthermore, the World Bank has estimated that more than 180 million lives could be saved in just the first half of this century if the prevalence of current tobacco users were cut in half by 2020, and providing access to adequate treatment would be a cornerstone of that approach.

Increase media-based tobacco counter-marketing campaigns: Although the tobacco industry will always far outspend tobacco control advocates, novel, entertaining, cutting-edge tobacco counter-marketing campaigns have been shown to attract attention and support far beyond the amount of funds spent and to have a direct effect on reducing tobacco use.

Increase regulation of all tobacco products: Tobacco is the most unregulated consumer product on the market today, exempt from important basic consumer protections, such as ingredient disclosure, product testing, accurate labeling, and restrictions on marketing to children.

Increase health warnings on tobacco packaging: As warnings become more graphic, tobacco users are more likely to pay attention to them.

Increase availability of tobacco health/economic information to the general public: Many tobacco users, policymakers, and even health care professionals are largely unaware, or only vaguely aware, of the other cancers, heart disease, lung disease, pre- and postnatal conditions, etc that are caused by tobacco use.

Increase primacy of health over commerce in trade agreements: Successful arguments have been made that excluding tobacco from trade agreements is compatible with international law, which provides for other harmful products such as landmines to be exempted. In addition, the World Trade Organization (WTO) has declared that human health is an important consideration and that if necessary, governments may "put aside WTO commitments" to protect human life.

Increase basic biomedical and applied tobacco control research

Increase the extent and accuracy of tobacco epidemiologic and surveillance data

Increase litigation aimed at the tobacco industry

DECREASE CHALLENGES

Decrease tobacco use by physicians and other health care providers: Many physicians and health care providers continue to use tobacco, with use reported to be as high as 50% or more in some countries

Decrease targeting of women: The WHO has estimated that the prevalence of smoking among women worldwide will be 20% by 2025, compared with the 12% of the world's women who currently smoke.

Decrease exposure to secondhand smoke: Providing smoke-free environments has been proven to not only protect nonsmokers, but also encourage smokers to quit and focus greater attention on the need for tobacco control measures.

Decrease illicit trade and smuggling

Decrease duty-free and reduced-cost sales of tobacco

Decrease tobacco advertising, promotion, and sponsorship

Decrease misleading tobacco product claims/descriptors

Decrease targeting of youth

Decrease subsidies for tobacco production

The report says there are certainly many other challenges not discussed in the report and that, while "resources- will never be enough to address all of these challenges," actions taken with the resources currently available will have a significant effect on global health. Finally, the report points to an issue it says rises above all others when considering the potential to reverse the global tobacco epidemic: the need for skilled, dedicated people to address the issues outlined in the report.

Source: The Medical News, 23 January 2010
Link: http://bit.ly/6wOTDY